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SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY! 



FRIENDLY COEEBSPONDENCE 

BETWEEN 

MOSES HULL, Spieitualist, 



W. F. PARKER, Christ^. 




iL&; 




y 



• Fair Truth, for thee alone we seek. 
Friend to the wise, supporter to the weak; 
From thee we learn whate'er is wise and just; 



Creeds to reject, professions to distrust; 
Forms to despise, pretensions to deride; 
And following thee to follow naught beside." 



BOSTON: 4 
WILLIAM WHITE AND COMPANY, 

Banner of Light Office, 
IN"o. 14 Hanover Street. 

1873. 






Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1873, 

By MOSES HULL, 

In the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at "Washington. 



Stereotyped at the Boston Stereotype Foundry, 
No. 19 Spring Lane. 



SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY? 



MOSES HULL'S FIRST LETTER. 

Bridgeport, Conn., May 19, 1872. 

W, F. Parker. 

My dear Brother : Excuse the liberty I take in 
addressing you, and more especially my rudeness in 
calling you my brother. The fact is, " we be breth- 
ren." " God hath made of one blood alf nations." You 
and I can not help it. I would not if I could, nor do I 
believe that you individually would. The truth is, you 
are better than your religion. I think you find it hard 
work to be a sectarian. Every discussion and every in- 
terview I have with you fastens the conviction upon 
me, that you are, like myself, more of a cosmopolitan 
or optimist than anything else. I do not believe that 
sects-churches are good for men who have grown to 
your stature. 

II. It may be good for men and women, even after 
they are grown, to unite on certain principles which 
may or may not be written. It may be well for them 
to confederate together for the promulgation of these 
principles ; but to believe that God. will go out of his 

3 



4 SPIRITUALISM OB CHRISTIANITY ? 

way to put some people into hell because they do not 
believe certain propositions, and take others to heaven 
because of a faith in certain dogmas, is an absurdity 
that, I beg leave to suggest, is out of harmony with 
your general character. 

III. Your views with regard to churches and church 
matters, I conceive, grow out of another error ; that 
is, that inspiration belongs only to one age or race. If 
you could only get thoroughly into sympathy with the 
idea that God is unchangeable, and that all men are 
brethren, that every age produces the phenomena of 
previous ages, and that men will differ as to the cause 
of their production, I think you could then see that 
Spiritualism is but a reproduction of the phenomenal 
part of all former religions, and that, instead of being 
at war with other religions, it comes as an explanation 
of the past. While its phenomena are similar to those 
that always have existed, to a greater or less extent, in 
every part of the world, it has, by proving itself and 
all other religions fallible, thrown its adherents en- 
tirely out of the idea of any teaching except absolute 
demonstration being authoritative. Spiritualism puts 
Confucius, Moses, Isaiah, Jesus, Paul, Mohammed, 
Swedenborg, and Andrew Jackson Davis on the 
same basis ; and instead of setting any one of them 
up as an absolute standard of authority either in 
preaching or practice, it takes them simply as helps, 
and strives to improve on their sayings and doings. 

IV. Christianity has never pretended to any more 
than strive to work up to a pattern it supposes this 
world to have had many hundred years since ; it is 
simply an imitation, and much that is played in the 
name of Christianity is only a burlesque imitation at 



HULL'S FIE ST LETTER. 5 

that. Spiritualism, while gathering aid from the sug- 
gestions and actions of all heroes, gods, and historic 
characters, puts " excelsior " at its mast-head, and does 
not propose to be content with simply an imitation of 
the life of Jesus or any other person. Discovering 
from the history of the past moral and physical world, 
that past ages have only been repeated efforts of na- 
ture to perfect and adjust her grand machine for mak- 
ing men and women, we spiritualists propose that 
we will not be content with any samples of manhood 
this world has yet produced. The world is young, 
and this age must produce a better religion and better 
men than the past has known. Weighed in the bal- 
ances of the present, every political, social, and re- 
ligious system of the past is found wanting. Let us 
have something better, larger, more potent. 

V. Indulge me now in the humble suggestion that 
your otherwise great soul is being cramped by its con- 
finement to the narrow systems of theology, which 
more or less bind you, a nineteenth century man, to 
the modes of thought of many hundred years in the 
past. I sometimes think that your keen perceptions, 
without words from me, will soon reveal to you the 
fatal mistake you make in your effort to put nine- 
teenth century wine into bottles from one thousand 
to six thousand years old. 

VI. In conclusion, I have written this letter, not 
with the idea of conveying to you any new thought, 
but for the purpose of calling out a response from 
you. You are my brother : I love you as such ; our 
debates have only endeared us as brothers ; we are 

y also bound by a tie that "the outside world " can 
know nothing of ; so I feel like going to work in ear- 



6 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY? 

nest to see if the gulf between us can not be bridged, 
or at least narrowed, to the end that we may get spir- 
itually near enough to each other so that each can see 
and know the other as he is. Should this call out a 
response from you, it may be followed by other letters, 
which, if they do not result in our seeing " eye to 
eye," will at least enable each to know more perfect- 
ly the ground occupied by the other. Should you 
answer this by silence, I would not take it as an of- 
fense, but would rather conclude that either a desire 
to avoid controversy or multitudinous cares had 
caused you to choose that which in many instances is 
the better part of valor. 

I am, my dear sir, 

Your well-wishing brother, 

Moses Hull. 



W. F. PARKER'S FIRST RESPONSE. 



Cedar Hill, near La Grange, Kt., 
May 23, 1872. 



Moses Hull, Esq. 



My dear Brother : Your very kind epistle, bear- 
ing date 19th inst., is at hand, and its contents have 
been duly considered. 

You need not ask me to " excuse " you for writing 
to me so kind a letter, or for calling me "brother." 
I am your brother, and I am the brother of every man 
for whom Jesus of Nazareth died ; and the longer I 
live, the more I desire to feel that spirit of universal 
brotherhood which made Jesus so unlike any man 



PARKER S FIRST RESPONSE. 7 

that ever lived before his time, and which has been 
but faintly repeated in the life of any person who has 
followed him. The common brotherhood of man is a 
cardinal doctrine of Christianity; and, therefore, a 
narrow-minded, selfish misanthrope can not be a 
Christian. Allow me to thank you for the fraternal 
sentiments of your letter, and to assure you that they 
are fully reciprocated. I flatter myself that I have 
learned one of Christ's lessons, which is, to distin- 
guish a man from the faith he has embraced. And, 
whilst I would assure you that . I have no sympathy 
for modern Spiritualism as a "doctrine," "philoso- 
phy," or "religion," still I love you as a man, and 
desire your deliverance from the unfortunate bondage 
into which I think you have fallen. 

I shall with pleasure read your letters, and candid- 
ly weigh your facts and arguments, and respond to 
them in the true spirit of the religion I profess ; and 
I shall also seek to convince you that Christianity, 
though eighteen hundred and seventy-two years old, 
is still far better for you and me than anything mod- 
ern Spiritualism has to offer. 

You say, " I do not believe that sects-churches are 
good for men who have grown to your (my) stature." 
Your belief here is sound. " Sects," "churches" in 
the common acceptation of those terms, are too small 
for full-grown men. But the " church of God "is so 
very spacious, that I assure you I am far from being 
of such a "stature" as to find.it unpleasant, un- 
profitable, or undesirable. I think, too, your " stat- 
ure " could find ample space for all its possible wants 
in that ancient institution. 

II. In your second item I think you show clearly 



8 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY ? 

that your dislike for the teachings of Christianity 
arises from not understanding them. "To believe," 
you say, " that God will go out of his way to put some 
people into hell because they do not believe certain 
propositions, and take others to heaven because of a 
faith in certain dogmas, is an absurdity . . . out of 
harmony with your (my) general character." 

True. 

But, 1. I do not, and never did, " believe " the " ab- 
surdity ' ' to which you allude. 

2. I know no Bible document that sets forth the 
absurdity which looks so horrible. It certainly formed 
no part of the teachings of Jesus, and surely it can 
not be charged upon an apostle. Hence you are 
illogical in rejecting Christianity because you suppose 
some so-called Christians have been unfortunate in 
their expositions of Christian teachings. 

III. You charge upon me another error which you 
seek kindly to correct. ... I have never af- 
firmed, either in writing or orally, that " inspiration " 
is confined " to one age or race." Such a statement 
would not be historically true. I do not know what 
you mean by " inspiration." But when you would 
have me believe that " Confucius, Moses, Isaiah, Je- 
sus, Paul, Mohammed, Swedexborg, and ANDREW 
JACKSON DAVIS " were equally inspired persons, 
and occupied the same "basis," I beg leave to say, I 
can not do so ivithout evidence. As this is a favorite 
dogma of the spiritualistic creed, I trust you will be 
ample here in the bestowment of reasons why these 
men are alike worthy our hearing, belief, and obedi- 
ence. Until the proof is forthcoming, I shall con- 
sider your statement as something written " for ap- 
pearance' sake," only. 



paeker's fiest pesponse. 9 

I would like to see your evidence for saying, — 

1. " That every age produces the phenomena of 
previous ages." Whilst this is true as to some phe- 
nomena, it is not true as to all phenomena. 

2. " That Spiritualism is but a reproduction of the 
phenomenal part of all former religions." 

3. That Spiritualism " comes as an explanation of 
the past" (religions). 

These assertions demand proof. Of course you are 
prepared to give it, or you would not ask me to be- 
lieve them. Let us have your proof — your proof, 
my brother. 

I am in full " sympathy with the idea that God is 
unchangeable," and "that all men are brethren." I 
could not be a Christian ancl deny these two truths. 
They lie at the bottom of Christ's teachings ; and 
he gave them to the world, first of all teachers, in the 
positive enunciation which makes them fruitful of 
good. At least we are not indebted to Spiritualism 
for them. And, although I as heartily accept them 
as you do, as fundamental items, still they do not suf- 
fer me to see at present- any good thing in modern 
Spiritualism. 

That Spiritualism has proved "itself fallible," as 
you say, I know ; but how, in consequence of this 
fact, it has proved " all other religions fallible," I 
can not see. . . . That Spiritualism " has thrown 
its adherents entirely out of the idea of any teaching, 
except absolute demonstration, being authoritative," 
I have no doubt ; and I hold this to be one of the un- 
pardonable crimes of Spiritualism against its own ad- 
herents. It will never succeed in throwing any one 
but one of " its adherents " out of that " idea." 



10 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY? 

Spiritualism takes " Confucius, Moses, Isaiah, Je- 
sus, Paul, Mohammed, Swedenborg, and Andrew 
Jackson Davis, . . . simply as helps, and strives 
to improve on their sayings and doings." Hence you 
would have me become a Spiritualist. Christians, 
too, can and do use all these as " helps." They use 
Confucius to show the impossibility of receiving 
from the unaided human mind a religion adapted to 
human wants ; they use Mohammed to show the differ- 
ence between a religion of force and a religion of love ; 
Swedenborg to illustrate the extravagances of human 
speculation ; and Andrew Jackson Davis to illustrate 
the madness of speculative atheism. These all help 
the Christian to understand human nature, and help 
him to the conviction, that men unaided from Heaven 
— even men, as you may insist, that are the media 
of disembodied spirits — can not give to the world 
anything worthy the name " religion." 

Moses, Isaiah, Jesus, and Paul, are also, to all men, 
specially to Christians, " helps" safe, sure, unerr- 
ing, to a religion full of power and glory — a religion 
fitted to meet and fully satisfy the entire body of the 
soul's requirements. Of course you do not believe 
this statement. I think you do not believe it, because 
you do not understand what " Moses, Isaiah, Jesus, 
and Paul " have given to the world for a religion. I 
hope to make this fact good before our correspondence 
closes. 

Please specify some of the improvements made by 
Spiritualists " on their teachings." 

IV. You say " Christianity " " is simply an im- 
itation." This I shall offset with the statement that 
" Christianity " is an imitation of nothing. 



paekee's fiest eesponse. 11 

As to the development of humanity, Spiritualism has 
no advantage over Christianity. If it has, I ask you to 
show it. 

V. I am a nineteenth century man ; but I have not 
yet experienced the unfitness of first century religion. 

I put the first century wine in first century bottles, 
and the nineteenth century wine into bottles of the 
same period. 

What is the "wine" of the nineteenth century? 
Show us wherein it is better than the " wine " of the 
first century. 

In conclusion, let me ask, Is the Spiritualism which 
you advocate, and wish me to embrace, " orderly " or 
" disorderly " ? Is it a philosophy, a religion, or 
both, or neither ? What is it ? What does it teach for 
truth ? Is its truth of any authority ? What has it 
done toward making its " adherents " better men and 
women, for the last twenty-five years ? 

Let me hear from you speedily. 

Affectionately yours, &c. 

W. F. Paekee. 



12 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY? 



MOSES HULL'S SECOND LETTER. 

New London, Conn., June 13, 1872. 

Brother, Parker : Knowing your soul, I ex- 
pected a response to my letter ; but your promptness 
this time even beats yourself a little. I will try to 
equal you in promptness and in the spirit of my letter, 
though I fall behind in every other particular. By 
the way, the reading of your letter only serves to 
strengthen the ever-growing bond of friendship I enter- 
tain for you ; and now, shall I take the advantage of 
this brotherly feeling, and ask you to agree that this 
exchange of letters shall continue to the number of 
somewhere from twelve to twenty, and that we after- 
ward publish them in some convenient form, for the 
benefit of the public ? By this I feel that the public 
would be the gainer. Not only would it get a little 
insight into the pros and cons of the issues between 
us, but we could manifest a spirit that would teach 
the world that people need not be either enemies or 
bigots because of a difference- of religious opinion. 

II. In the first paragraph of your letter I could not 
but notice a little of the shrivelling effect of your 
religion. You are " a brother of every man for whom 
Jesus of Nazareth died." Jsow, I do not believe Jesus 
of Nazareth died for me. Are you therefore not my 
brother ? Suppose Jesus had not died at all ; would 
you not have any brothers ? Is it the death of Jesus 



hull's second letter. 13 

that makes you the brother of the human family ? or 
are you a brother to all because all are the offspring 
of God ? (See Acts xvii. 28.) Come, my brother, 
let us permit our fraternal feelings to take in more 
than those who accept a dogma. Jesus did not claim 
that spirit of universal brotherhood of which you 
boast ; on the contrary, he would not allow any to be 
his brethren unless they complied with certain con- 
ditions. Please turn to Matt, xii., and read carefully 
from verse 46 to the end of the chapter. That will 
teach you that it is your manhood, and not your Chris- 
tianity, that leads you to a belief in the universal 
brotherhood of man. 

I thank you for your expressed desire for my de- 
liverance from " unfortunate bondage," and shall sec- 
ond every movement you make to show me the better 
way. Be sure your arguments will be candidly read, 
and weighed as impartially as my ability will allow. 

So you think you find ample room " in the church 
of God " for growth. Well, that is probable. I 
do not know where that church is ; it is just possible 
that I am a member of it. I hope you will not confine 
it to some narrow sect. If so, please tell me what 
one ; that will at least help me to know what churches 
are not " God's churches." Wouldn't it be queer if it 
should turn out that all are God's people, and that he 
never took much stock in any of the churches ? 

It is possible that I do not "understand the teach- 
ings of Christianity." I have no knowledge on the 
subject, only what I get from its books and teachers. 
The propositions about putting people into hell, how- 
ever, do belong to the Bible and Christianity; for 
proof, see Ps. ix. 17; Matt, v. 29, 30, x. 28; Rev. 
xix. 20, xx. 10. 



14 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY? 

III. I think you misread the third paragraph of 
my letter. I did not intend to state that Confucius, 
Moses, A. J. Davis, et ah were equally inspired. I 
did intend to convey the idea that each was in- 
spired to his fullest capacity. I would not un- 
dertake to state which of these great men had the 
most direct or thorough inspiration, nor yet which 
was surrounded by the more honorable or intellec- 
tual class of influences. I could not ask you to 
take any of these men as being " worthy our hearing, 
belief, and obedience," any further than what they 
said commended itself to your judgment. Brother, 
you have an inspiration as true as that of any other 
man ; it is not infalhble, but it is all you have ; follow 
it. I hardly know what you mean by asking evidence 
" that these men were alike worthy our hearing," &c. 
Do you wish me to show the infallibility of Confucius, 
Swedenborg, or Andrew Jackson Davis? or the fal- 
libility of Moses, Isaiah, and Jesus ? As to the former, 
I confess their liability to err ; and as to the latter, I 
can present you many pages of positive proof that they 
were only erring men. If Moses was guided by an 
unerring inspiration when he said, " An eye for an eye 
and a tooth for a tooth," then the influence that 
prompted Jesus erred when it said, " But I say unto 
you, that ye resist not evil." 

IV. You ask proof of three important assertions in 
my former letter. I will briefly answer your ques- 
tions, seriatim. 

1. " That every age produces the phenomena of 
previous ages." In general you acknowledge this to 
be true ; yet you say, " It is not true of all phenomena." 
Quite likely ! Do you not see that the onus probandi 



hull's second letter. 15 

is in your hand. You ought to have shown me the 
exception. I did not mean to have you understand that 
every particular phenomenon was repeated in every 
age. But I do mean to say phenomena of the same 
class are continually repeating themselves. You re- 
member what Solomon said on this subject : " The 
thing that hath been, it is that which shall be, and 
that which is done is that which shall be done, and 
there is nothing new under the sun." Eccl. i. 9. 

2. " That Spiritualism is but a reproduction of the 
phenomenal part of all former religions." I can not 
now take up all former religions, and show the proof 
of this proposition. I will give you a few instances in 
Judaism and Christianity, and examine any excep- 
tions you may bring from the history of the past. 

The wonderful deliverance of the children of Israel 
from bondage, and their establishment as a nation, was 
the result of the angel appearing and talking to Moses. 
It was mecliumship that enabled Joshua to do his great 
work. Elihu describes very minutely one of his clair- 
voyant visions. The phenomenon of the appearance 
of Samuel is paralleled by similar phenomena to-day. 
Every event connected with the various appearances 
of Jesus finds its parallel in the Spiritualism of to-day. 
The disciples, speaking as the spirit gave them utter- 
ance, on the day of Pentecost, finds its equal in modern 
trance speaking. For proof of this, see Ex. hi. 2 ; 
Acts vii. 30 ; Deut. xxxiv. 9 ; Job iv. 12-17 ; 1 Sam. 
xxviii. 14-20 ; Acts ii. 1-4. 

3. " That Spiritualism comes as an explanation of 
the past theologies." One great proof of that lies in 
the fact that out of deference to it almost every min- 
ister (and I think you are not an exception) has re- 



16 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY? 

adjusted his discourses. The " thus saith the Lord," 
in the Bible, becomes thus saith a spirit ; thus the 
supreme Ruler of the universe is not held responsible 
for all the nonsense following that form of expression 
in the Bible. While the ignorance of the people of 
past ages would incline them to a belief in the god- 
head of every spirit that communicated, the fallibility 
of communications given through prophets of old has 
taught spiritualists not to receive as authority the 
dictum of any spirit. 

V. You " can not see how Spiritualism has proved 
all other religions fallible." Well, I may have been 
too fast in that. I think I was. Every religion has 
presented in itself all-sufficient proof of its fallibility. 
Spiritualism was not needed for that work. Yet if 
anything had been needed on that point, Spiritualism 
has proved that unless a stream can arise above its 
fountain, all religions are fallible. The spirit world 
itself, the source of religions, is fallible. 

Then you do think there is authoritative teaching 
somewhere. Please tell me in your next where it is, 
and who is the teacher. On this point I think I have 
light for you. 

I am a little astonished that Christians should so 
prostitute the proper use of Confucius, Mohammed, 
Sweclenborg, and A. J. Davis. Yet all goes to show 
how perverted one's vision can become. I notice we 
can not exalt one person above what he should be 
without sinking others correspondingly low. Let me 
suggest that your admiration of the good Nazarene 
prevents your doiug justice by the other persons you 
mention. Confucius' mind was not unaided. Mo- 
hammed's religion was no more one of force than were 



hull's second letteb. 17 

Judaism and Christianity ; and surely Swedenborg 
nor any one else could " illustrate trie extravagances 
of human speculation" more than did Jesus. If you 
want proof, I will mention a few points in my next 
letter. So far as A. J. Davis' atheism is concerned, 
you could not possibly have shot farther from the 
mark. Have you read his "Arabula"? It is the 
grandest argument against atheism that it has been 
my fortune to. read. 

I join with you in the " hope " that your " facts " 
concerning Moses, Isaiah, Jesus, and Paul will be 
made plain before our correspondence closes. On this 
subject, brother, " Lo, I am with you always, even 
unto the end of the world." In this department of 
our correspondence I will bring out some of the spe- 
cifications you call for. 

VI. You think Christianity is not an imitation; 
then it fails in its design. Jesus' words are, " Follow 
me." Paul says, " As I follow Christ, so follow me." 
Matt. viii. 22 ; 1 Cor. xi. 1. 

VII. My brother, this letter is lengthening almost 
beyond what courtesy could demand of you to read ; 
yet I must notice one request of yours, and I hope you 
will occupy all the space you wish in reply. You ask 
me to show the advantage of Spiritualism over Chris- 
tianity in the development of humanity. Please ex- 
amine the following twenty propositions. I will give 
you more before this correspondence ceases.* 

Spiritualism is better calculated to elevate man than 
Judaism or Christianity, — 

* The substance of these propositions is taken from the author's 
manuscripts of a book since published by William White & Co., and 
for sale at their store, 14 Hanover Street, Boston. The title of the 
book is " The Contrast : Evangelicalism and Spiritualism Com- 
pared." Price $1.50; postage 16 cents. 



18 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY? 

1. Because it recognizes the soul as being the highest 
authority. Its language is, Man has an inspiration 
which, if followed, will guide him as unerringly as the 
instincts of a bird will guide it on its wing. 

2. Because it teaches that all spirit is the same, 
whether in God or man, and that the lowest, by virtue 
of their relationship with Deity, can, by proper effort, 
develop and bring into activity the God within. 

3. Because, in denying the possibility of the pardon 
of sin in any sense of the word that would permit the 
culprits to escape the penalty, it teaches them to re- 
frain from sin as the only means of happiness here and 
hereafter. 

4. Because the evidences of its phenomena are 
more in harmony with reason, and better certified 
than those of the Bible. Its phenomena, being proved 
by living witnesses, are established by as much better 
evidence than those of the Bible as " a living dog is 
better than a dead lion." 

5. Because it is the only religion that teaches the 
absolute equality of men. Even Jesus calls the Gen- 
tiles "dogs," and urges that "it is not meet to take 
the children's bread and give it to the dogs ; " and 
when he commissioned his disciples to preach, his first 
commission was, " Into any city of the Gentiles enter 
ye not ; " the second was, to " begin at Jerusalem." 

6. Because it teaches that perfection never having 
been attained by any one in this life, there is room to 
live a better life than ever was lived, and urges upon 
each one to take as an example the good of all historic 
characters, and in themselves develop some good 
never yet illustrated in humanity. 

7. Because it is the only religion that teaches that 



hull's second lettee. 19 

the standard by which every one is to be judged can 
not be swerved by any extraneous power, such as 
prayer, sacrifices, or the blood of the atonement. 

8. Because, instead of looking to a future day of 
judgment, when an arbitrary tyrant shall reward or 
punish men for the belief or disbelief of a dogma, it 
teaches that every man shall here and hereafter re- 
ceive the consequence of every act. 

9. Because it teaches that every man must be true 
to his condition. It would, therefore, treat the klep- 
tomaniac or murderer as diseased, and find a refuge and 
proper medical treatment for him, thus elevating him 
beyond the possibility of committing crime. 

10. Because it makes the practice of the virtues 
the only path to happiness here and hereafter. It 
allows no supererogative work to step between man 
and his duty. 

11. Because it places all men on the same basis, 
teaching that all are children of the same family, and 
believing that the ultimate destiny of all is to happi- 
ness, it, instead of saying, " Let him that is filthy be 
filthy still," works for the elevation of those whom 
others recognize as incorrigible. 

12. Because it teaches the principle of fellowship 
of the entire human family, while Christianity only 
teaches the fellowship of a certain class, urging that 
some are of their father, the devil, while others, on 
certain conditions, may become the children of our 
Father in heaven. 

13. Because it is the only religion that teaches 
man that the only method of elevating himself is by 
the elevation of others, thus giving him a stimulus to 
work for others in order to help himself. 



20 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY? 

14. Because its revelations and documents are al- 
wa}-s written in the language of those for whom it is 
written, thus saving its adherents the valuable time 
and money thrown away by others in the study of 
languages that no erudition can enable one to per- 
fectly understand, thus giving its adherents more 
time for the pursuit of ethical and scientific studies. 

15. Because it teaches, as did ancient heathenism, 
as Paul was compelled to acknowledge, that man is 
the offspring of God, a part and parcel of nature, 
and thus invites its adherents to the study of nature 
in order that they may understand themselves : thus 
time thrown away in the study of a book which 
teaches that God and nature are at war with each 
other, is by the Spiritualists spent in looking through 
science to nature's God. 

16. Because it advocates the principle of self-abne- 
gation here in order to perfect happiness here and 
hereafter, thus enabling its adherents to endure the 
scoffs and sneers' of an infidel Christianity. 

17. Because it lifts its adherents out of a cold 
church materialism, and gives them a knowledge of 
endless life. 

18. Because it calls the mind away from the weak, 
revengeful, passionate, illiterate human spirit that the 
Bible calls God, and bids its adherents behold God in 
all nature. 

19. Because it does not compel its adherents, by 
forms, ceremonies, and memorials, to remember that 
a Christ was once on earth, but bids them now find 
him afflicted, sick, and imprisoned, and minister unto 
his wants. 

20. Because it to-day carries with it living tests 



parker's second letter. 21 

that no other religion has, that the ministers of other 
religions dare not even see, lest they should be con- 
verted and healed. 

VIII. You ask whether the Spiritualism I wish you 
to embrace is orderly or disorderly. I answer, yes. My 
Spiritualism is both a philosophy and religion. Some 
of it is written in books, some of it is not. It teaches 
" for truth" that man, as a spiritual being, is allied to 
the world of spirits ; that spirit comes en rapport with 
spirit, whether in or out of the body. Thus it puts 
the fact of spirit communion as demonstrative, and 
therefore " authoritative." " What has it done to 
make its adherents better ? " I answer, in the lan- 
guage of Paul, " Much every way." 

Hoping to hear from you soon, and that our corre- 
spondence may soon develop into a pointed and con- 
cise presentation of the issues between us. 
Permit me to subscribe myself 

Your brother, 

Moses Hull. 



W. F. PARKER'S SECOND LETTER. 

Cedar Hill, near La Grange, Kt., 
June 11, 1872. 

Moses Hull, Esq. 

Dear Brother : Your very long letter is at hand . 
I have plodded through it with considerable interest, 
as I always feel pleased with your ideas, although I 
consider them totally out of the pale of truth. I need 
not occupy space in returning to you assurances that 



22 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY? 

your fraternal feeling toward me finds always its re- 
flection in me. 

Your letter contains so many things said, that if I 
were to pay even a passing attention to them, my let- 
ter would swell into colossal proportions, greater than 
those of your last epistle. I shall, therefore, leave a 
multitude of things unnoticed, and let them " go to the 
jury " for what they are worth. Still, I will endeavor 
to dig out the important matters, and consider them 
as fully as possible without being tedious. 

You are at liberty to put into print anything I may 
write ; and you may continue to write me whatever 
number of letters you shall please, and if I can find 
time from my other duties I will promptly respond. 

I. Your supposition that I consider myself a broth- 
er only of a class of persons for whom Jesus of Naz- 
areth died, is quite erroneous. Jesus did not die 
for a " class," but "for the world " — for humanity. 
Hence I would say, that I love all men, and esteem 
them brethren, for the following reasons : — 

1. Because God " hath made of one blood all nations 
of men." Acts xvii. 26. 

2. Because all men are the objects alike of the di- 
vine love and providence. 

3. Because the individual growth into better things 
depends on the aggregate growth, and vice versa, God 
having made all men thus mutually dependent. 

4. Because the Christ laid down his life for all men, 
thus linking all men to the same individual center, 
and thus expressing the true idea of universal broth- 
erhood. 

Besides these reasons, which I think are more and 
better than you can give for your love of all men, the 



packer's second letter. 23 

Bible, Christianity, gives many others why I should 
be a brother to every human being on earth. 

I have examined the passage to which you refer in 
Matt. xii. 46-50. You quote it to prove that Jesus 
did not have the spirit of universal brotherhood in his 
heart. Now, to my mind, the spirit of universal broth- 
erhood breathes in every word of it. You say every 
man is inspired — every man does the will of God. 
Jesus says, " Whosoever shall do the will of my Father 
which is in heaven, the same is my brother, and sis- 
ter, and mother." You certainly ought not to impute 
narrowness to Jesus. 

But when you contemplate Jesus growing up amidst 
the prejudices of the Jewish people, and speaking and 
acting as he does, as though those prejudices were to- 
tally alien from him, you must find in him an expres- 
sion of fraternity for man before which yours and 
mine pales into nothingness, since our education and 
training have been begun and carried on under the 
influence of a constant inculcation of that duty by 
our parents and teachers, as well as by the spirit of the 
age in which we live. Compare the spirit of Jesus 
with the spirit of the age in which he lived, and you 
will never again accuse him of narrowness. 

II. In your first letter 3 r ou said, " To believe that 
God will go out of his way to put some persons into 
hell because they do not believe certain propositions, 
and take others to heaven because of a faith in cer- 
tain dogmas, is an absurdity that, I beg leave to sug- 
gest, is out of harmony with your general character.' ' 
I denied that these ideas find any support either from 
the Old or New Testament. You proceed to show 
me the Bible proof of your words. You quote four 



24 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY ? 

passages. You should have given the words, not the 
places only where the words could be found. Give 
us hereafter the language of the passages to which 
you refer ; then we shall be able to see at once wheth- 
er your language can be found in holy writ. 

In Matt. v. 29, 30, not one word is said about " dog- 
mas " or "propositions" of any kind; not one word 
is said of " believing " or not believing anything. 

The same is true of your second passage. 

The same is true of your third passage, and the 
same is true of your fourth passage. Such proof, my 
brother, looks quite suspicious. 

III. As to the " inspiration " of such beings as Con- 
fucius, A. J. Davis, &c, the question nauseates me. 
It only shows how degraded human reason may be- 
come when it finds pleasure in defending so unhappy 
a theory. I do not allude to your reason, but to the 
reason of those persons who believe in "inspiration," 
and that Confucius and Davis were inspired. You do 
not believe in inspiration at all. With you there is 
no such anomaly. 

You promise me many pages of proof that Moses, 
Isaiah, &c, were "fallible men." I admit that they 
were fallible men. I deny that they were fallible 
prophets. I deny that their teachings, uttered as 
teachings, are fallible. Of course the proof you prom- 
ise us will be forthcoming. I remember a little book 
you once published called God's and the Devil's Me- 
diums — The Contrast. In that document you at- 
tempt to array proof of the fallibility of God's proph- 
ets. Of course you will reproduce that proof. I de- 
sire you to do it. When that promised evidence shall 
be adduced, you will find me ready to correct you. 



parkee's second letter. 25 

IV. In your fourth section you profess to give me 
some instances in "Judaism and Christianity," show- 
ing that modern Spiritualism " is a reproduction of 
the phenomenal part of all former religions." You, 
in these instances, allude to certain angel ministra- 
tions, and boldly say these find "equals in modern 
trance speaking." I deny in toto your statement. 
There is no likeness, let alone identity, in the cases. I 
do not see how a sane mind can be so oblivious to such 
significant facts as yours seems to be in viewing the 
record of Bible phenomena. I shall spend no time 
on your proof texts now, as this very matter will 
doubtless be brought before us again, and then your 
proof shall be effectually ventilated. 

V. You ask me, " Then you do think there is au- 
thoritative teaching somewhere. Please tell me in 
your next where it is, and who is the teacher." 

I respond, 1. I do so think. 

2. Jesus is the teacher. 

3. The Scriptures give us the teaching. 

The evidences of Christianity are before the people. 
It does not devolve upon me to defend Christianity by 
proving it true ; it does devolve upon you to prove 
Christianity false, if you can. As you may desire a 
brief statement of one or two reasons why I answer 
your query as I do, I submit. 

1. The Old Testament proves itself true, conse- 
quently authoritative, in proving its author the Om- 
nicient God. 

2. The New Testament proves itself true, and Je- 
sus authority, in proving that he is the Son of God. 

If these two propositions be true, — and true they 
are, — has Spiritualism anything better to offer ? 



26 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY ? 

VI. On your sixth point I shall say nothing, any fur- 
ther than this : By " imitation " in your first letter I 
understood you to mean that Christianity was only an 
imitation of some imposture preceding its appearance. 
I think this was what you desired me to understand. 
But since you have abandoned that idea, I agree with 
you that " Christianity " is an imitation of Christ. 

VII. I come now to your " magnitudinous " cata- 
logue of reasons why Spiritualism is better calculated 
to elevate humanity than Christianity. 

Am I to closely and critically try your reasons ? 
You certainly do not expect that. Besides, such an 
examination is not demanded ; for I perceive that the 
substance of your twenty ponderous reasons has actu- 
ally been " borrowed " from Christianity. 

1. Your first reason says, " Because it (Spiritual- 
ism) recognizes the soul as being the highest authori- 
ty." Now, unfortunately for the claims of Spiritual- 
ism, Christ gave to the world the first true ideas of 
the soul, and its education for time and eternity. 
Outside of Christianity I know nothing that looks 
like a doctrine of the soul. I am aware that certain 
ancients have said some things about the soul; but 
those things were ever said hesitatingly, and I may say 
inquiringly. They doubted as to its existence. And 
as for the higher life of the soul, the perfection of its 
immortal capacities for endless happiness, I think 
the idea was totally unknown to them. The true 
doctrine of the soul is found in the teachings of 
Jesus. 

It is a proposition which you can not prove, when 
you say the soul is its own highest authority. I would 
like to see you make good this proposition. If the 



27 

proposition is not true, then Spiritualism is welcome 
to all the advantages of an error. If it is true, it 
gives Spiritualism no grounds to boast over Christiani- 
ty. God, even, in the gospel appeals to the soul, and 
in no instance does it any violence, thus recognizing 
its total freedom. It is this freedom of the soul that 
looks so lovely to you, and which you would have me 
accept as a doctrine of Spiritualism. But this free- 
dom of the soul to choose or reject even what God 
proffers it is what everywhere finds expression in the 
soul doctrines of Jesus. 

Man has been following his " inspiration " for thou- 
sands of years, and I am unable to see anything into 
which it has "unerringly guided him," unless it has 
been into folly, excess, crime, and misery. Spiritual- 
ism may have all it can gain from its doctrine of uni- 
versal " inspiration." I feel certain that the doctrine 
of special inspiration has many fruitful advantages 
over it. 

2. Your second reason, when translated into correct 
speech, is entirely borrowed from Christianity. 

3. Your third reason demands a little attention. 
You say Spiritualism denies the possibility of any par- 
don for any fault, and that therefore it is better cal- 
culated to make men moral and happy than Chris- 
tianity, which teaches that all sins against God and 
man may be pardoned. I can not see the advantage 
claimed here by Spiritualism. The inevitable punish- 
ment of sin is a cardinal doctrine of the Bible. The 
doctrine of Christianity here is clear. It is this : 1. 
All are here for the formation of a character for eter- 
nity. 2. Every deed done, word uttered, or thought 
indulged, fixes its stamp upon the character. 3. Hence 



28 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY? 

all the terrors of an eternally deformed character are 
held up by the gospel before the wicked to deter them 
from the pursuit of folly and sin, and to incite them 
to the cultivation of the soul's faculties for eternal 
life. Spiritualism can do no more than this. Even 
this teaching of Christianity, Spiritualism would steal, 
and parade as its own. But Spiritualism repudiates 
the doctrine of pardon entirely, you say. Then of 
course it would take out of the human heart the 
spirit of pardon, and it would blot out of our vocabu- 
lary the term pardon. Shylock's pound of flesh is 
Spiritualism's principle and spirit. No more pardon 
on earth, no more pardon in heaven ; for the doctrine 
is full of evil, and the practice is worse than the doc- 
trine. Eye for eye, tooth for tooth, blood for blood, 
is the law of Spiritualism. I do not see how you are 
to escape these horrible consequences. I rather think 
the compassionate, forgiving disposition of the gospel 
will be more in accordance with the wants of the soul, 
and better calculated to induce bad men to become 
good. 

4. Your fourth reason says, " The evidences of its 
phenomena are more in harmony with reason," &c. 

With whose reason ? 

Give us some of the " evidences of its phenomena, 
which are more in harmony with reason " than the 
evidences of Christianity. 

Christianity is a logic — a proposition and its homo- 
geneous proof. 

Spiritualism is not a logic ; it has no proposition 
with its homogeneous proof. It is a mass of assertions 
taken from every source, and offered upon the most 
heterogeneous phenomena. Spiritualists have not de- 



paekeb's second letter. 29 

termined what Spiritualism is ; whether it is a science, 
a philosophy, a religion, or anything else. The phe- 
nomena on which they lean are self-contradictory; 
their " inspirations " are self-contradictory ; their 
teachings are self-contradictory ; everything in Spirit- 
ualism is self-contradictory, hence false and destruc- 
tive. If these things be not so, you are the man to 
show it. 

5. Your fifth reason is stolen from Christianity. 
You say Spiritualism is the only religion that teaches 
the absolute equality of man. Now, sir, you have 
read the New Testament to little advantage, or you 
could not have made such an erroneous statement. 
Jesus was the first to teach the universal Fatherhood 
of God, and brotherhood of man. The passages al- 
luded to by you all confirm my statement, when they 
are viewed, as they should be, in the light of Christ's 
own teaching. 

6. Your sixth reason, which is based on the fact 
that Spiritualism teaches that the crimes and errors 
of this life can be and will be corrected in the life to 
come, I consider unfortunate indeed. In one of your 
reasons you have every man punished without any 
hope of pardon, and in this you hold out the prospect 
of pardon, after a life spent in the most horrid ex- 
cesses and crimes. 

I know no doctrine better calculated to keep men 
in the practice of crime in this life than that which 
teaches them that they shall have opportunity for re- 
pentance after death. I only know one thing worse 
than this in its moral effects, and that is, the doctrine 
of some Spiritualists, that crime and virtue are equal- 
ly meritorious and praiseworthy. 



30 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY? 

Christianity teaches us that the human spirit will 
always progress. Like God in its attributes, infinity 
of growth is before it. Spiritualism has borrowed 
even this doctrine from Christianity. 

7. I am unable to understand your seventh reason. 
If you intend to say that Spiritualism is the only re- 
ligion which has a standard by which every one is to 
be judged, which can not be removed by anything such 
as prayer, sacrifices, or the blood of atonement, then I 
say, your reason is groundless ; for while Christianity 
teaches an atonement effected by blood, and sacrifices, 
and prayers, yet the standard is always the same, and 
can not be put out of the way. Will you be so kind 
as to tell me what the standard is by which Spiritual- 
ism has anything judged ? What is the judgment of 
which you speak ? Who is the judge ? What is the 
code of law by which actions are to be tried ? What 
are the sanctions of the laws of that code? And 
what is the power by which the sanction is enforced ? 
I was not before this hour aware that Spiritualism had 
borrowed even the Bible doctrine of retribution, a 
judge, a judgment, and a penalty, together with an 
unerring standard of rectitude. Give us a little 
"light " here, if you please. 

8. Your eighth reason is worded more from imagi- 
nation than from knowledge of Bible teaching. " Ar- 
bitrary tyrant," punishing for " disbelief of a dogma," 
is a phantom of your own. But that " every man shall 
here and hereafter receive the consequences of every 
act " is the doctrine of Christianity. " For whatsoever 
a man soweth, that shall he also reap." Gal. vi. 7. " Be- 
hold the righteous shall be recompensed in the earth ; 
much more the wicked and the sinner" Prov. xi. 31. 



parker's second letter. 31 

9. There is more "fancy" in your ninth reason 
than philosophy. Its spirit pervades Christianity, i. e., 
the spirit that should impel us to sympathy for the 
fallen and effort for his rescue. " Brethren," says 
Paul, " if a man be overtaken in a fault, ye which are 
spiritual, restore such an one in the spirit of meek- 
ness." Gal. vi. 1. 

What kind of medical treatment will cure klepto- 
mania ? What kind of physic will cure a murderer 
of his thirst for blood ? If physic or medical treat- 
ment can do these moral works, will not Christian 
physicians do as well as any other ? How many klep- 
tomaniacs and murderers has Spiritualism u elevated 
beyond the possibility of committing crime " during the 
last twenty-five years ? 

10. Your tenth is taken " body and soul " out of the 
" Army of faith." That is Christianity, not Spirit- 
ualism. Please do not spend labor to convert me to 
my own religion. 

11. So also is your eleventh, according to the in- 
terpretation of Universalists. Hence you have bor- 
rowed the idea of universal salvation from teachers 
professedly Christian. But you teach a different 
doctrine from this, when you teach that there is no 
pardon. 

12. Your twelfth reason — universal fellowship — 
is one of the cardinal items of the gospel. It grows 
out of the universal Fatherhood of God and brother- 
hood of man, and finds ample statement in the words 
of the Lord : " Therefore all things whatsoever ye 
would that men should do to you, do ye even so to 
them." Matt. vii. 12. 

13. Your thirteenth reason is also appropriated from 
Christianity, 



32 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY? 

14. I give you all your fourteenth reason can avail 
you. But with wise men, who have given much study 
to this matter, it will avail you little. 

15. I see nothing in your fifteenth reason which gives 
Spiritualism any advantage over Christianity; for Chris- 
tianity teaches that God is the father of all ; that man is 
his workmanship, hence a part of what is called nature ; 
that to study nature is to know God and the works 
of God ; that the Christian's God is the God of nature, 
and that nature and God are in complete harmony ; 
that the Author of the Bible is the Author of nature ; 
and he who knows nature best is best able to know 
the Bible. See Dr. McCosh's Typical Forms in Crea- 
tion. 

16. I deny that your sixteenth reason is to be found 
in the teachings of modern Spiritualism at all, so far 
as I have been able to examine the documents of your 
teachers. On the other hand, I can adduce abun- 
dance of proof that your teachers advocate an almost 
unbridled license, in consequence of which one of 
your luminaries has said concerning the teaching of 
your Rabbis, — 

We are taught that " those that act the worst will 
progress the fastest; " that " we must go through hell 
to get to heaven ; " that a certain drunken woman of 
ill fame " will become more noble than she otherwise 
could; " that " sin is a lesser degree of righteousness; " 
that " there is no high, no low, no good, no bad ; " that 
"murder is right, lying is right, adultery is right; " 
that " whatever is, is right ; " that "it is wrong to 
blame any; " that " none should be punished; " that 
" we must not expose iniquity, because it will harden 
the guilty; " that " the union of the sexes is a great 



paeker's second letter. 33 

help to mediums to get spiritual elements," but "if 
the parties are not adapted, it is a great evil, and an 
awful wrong;" that " as people develop, they become 
unadapted and poison each other ; " that " affinities 
will be perfectly satisfied with each other ; " that " to 
live together without perfect love is worse than pros- 
titution," &c, &c. 

What are the results ? Just what every student of 
human nature ought to expect. 

And now, as to the principle of self-denial, the gos- 
pel lays that down as indispensably necessary to all 
reformation of life and character, in order to "happi- 
ness here or hereafter." I sincerely object to your 
appropriating gospel livery for the service of Spirit- 
ualism. 

17. So does Christianity. 

18. Your eighteenth reason will demand a little 
more attention than I have been able to give some 
other items. 

You have, in your various publications and speeches, 
said much against the character of the God of Moses. 
But what you have said is by no means original with 
you. For over eighteen centuries certain enemies of 
the Bible have endeavored to show that the God of the 
Jews was a monster of vice and meanness ; and yet I 
have failed to see any evidence that would justify the 
insinuations and slanders heaped upon the divine name. 
That Moses and Joshua have recorded some things 
which we in this age think derogatory to the divine 
character is true. But when those records are viewed. 
in connection with the facts which called them forth, 
I think they give a proper representation of the mat- 
3 



34 SPIRITUALISM OK CHRISTIANITY? 

ter, and lose all the horror with which they seem to 
be clothed. 

It was not for Moses to tell the whole truth. The 
revelation of the divine character in history was a 
progressive work ; and it was left for Jesus to give a 
full manifestation of the character of God. Your in- 
terpretation of the divine character should embrace 
all that Jesus has disclosed ; and I know that he has 
given such a description of the divine character, as to 
more than explain and remove the apparent difficul- 
ties met with in the Old Testament records. I say 
apparent difficulties, because I am sure the conclusions 
you draw from the Old Testament records are not 
justified by those records. And when you shall pre- 
sent the particular facts constituting your evidence, 
I shall be ready to show you that they do not justify 
your reproaches cast upon the divine name. 

The Christian documents have given a full exhi- 
bition of the perfection of God's character. Nor has 
Spiritualism a correct idea of God which it has not 
borrowed from those very documents. If you think 
I am in error here, you will please inform me of any 
discovery in this direction for which the world is in- 
debted to your " religio-philosophy." 

Your eighteenth reason you thus boldly enounce : 
" Because it calls the mind away from the weak, re- 
vengeful, passionate, illiterate HUMAN SPIRIT that the 
Bible calls God, and bids its adherents behold God in 
all nature." This certainly is one thing which pre- 
tentious Spiritualism does not borrow from Christiani- 
ty. And this is one thing, which, to my mind, covers 
Spiritualism with the most horrible shame. It fairly 
expresses the animus of Spiritualism. It fairly mani- 



paeker's second letter. 35 

fests the desperate extremes to which the fallacies of 
Spiritualism drive its adherents. 

I simply affirm that the " Bible " knows no such 
"human spirit" called " God." Of course you will 
now proceed to repeat, for the ten thousandth time, 
the distorted, perverted, and unreasonable " facts " 
which the enemies of " God " have repeated from the 
foundation of the Christian age, drawn from the an- 
cient Scripture records, in total disregard of legiti- 
mate canons of interpretation, and in a total disregard 
of all other facts in the case, which condemn and over- 
whelm with confusion the imputations cast upon the 
Jehovah of the Bible. When your catalogue of stale 
quotations shall be spread before me, I will give them 
a proper ventilation. 

But your joy rises high enough when you try to 
persuade yourself and me that Spiritualism " bids its 
adherents behold God in all nature." That bid is an 
equivocal one. Do you intend to say that Spiritual- 
ism "bids its adherents behold" " in all nature " the 
works of God, a Creator, Governor, and Sustainer? 
Then I say Spiritualism teaches its adherents to be- 
hold no such thing, unless it has changed its teachings 
within the past few weeks. Christianity so bids its 
adherents. And so the Bible teaches all to learn God 
" in the works of his hands," " the heavens, the earth, 
and all things that in them are." If you mean to say 
that Spiritualism " bids its adherents behold God in all 
nature, God in mud, filth, dung, grass, and flesh, then I 
say a God made out of a " weak, revengeful, passionate, 
illiterate human spirit " would be inexpressibly the bet- 
ter one. You would ask me to reject Bible Deism for 
the unphilosophical and degrading belief of Pantheism. 



36 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY? 

Never, no, never, my brother. Will you tell me wherein 
your stone-god, mud-god, filth-god, dung-god, vegeta- 
ble-god, and flesh-god, is better than the all-wise, all- 
powerful, just, holy, benevolent, merciful, and phi- 
lanthropic infinite Spirit, called God in the Bible ? I 
wait anxiously your answer. 

19. As to your next reason, I will say, — 

1. In your repudiating " forms, ceremonies, and 
memorials" you declare Spiritualism totally unadapted 
to human nature. 

2. Christianity, in providing these, gives to us, as hu- 
man creatures, what our nature demands in an effective 
religion. 

3. These in Christianity are not only, as you would 
have me believe, " to remember that there was once a 
Christ on earth." By no means. But these keep 
alive that fruitful remembrance, and embody the 
grand spiritual and philanthropic spirit of Christianity, 
always stimulating its force in the individual and col- 
lective heart of Christians. 

4. Spiritualism has nothing of this kind ; hence such 
doleful complaints as these : — 

" In addition to an increase of co-operative unity of 
method, and systematized order, Spiritualists need 
more culture and a deeper religious baptism." — Year 
Booh, 1871, p. 25. 

4 ' If we wish to spread what we believe to be the 
truth, we must pursue a different course from the 
past ; if we do not, as a society, Spiritualists are dead 
— past resurrection." — Year Book, p. 85. 

5. Hear a Spiritualist on Christianity : — 
"Instrumentalities are as necessary as principles. 

Christianity, considered organically, is, comparatively 



parker's second letter. 37 

speaking, perfection. . . . Spiritualists, there- 
fore, should adopt the methods of the church." Cephas 
B. Lynn. — Year Book, p. 98. 

I object to your adopting " the methods of the 
church," and then trying to persuade me and the 
world that Spiritualism is better than "perfection." 

6. Christianity, not Spiritualism, teaches men " now 
to find Christ sick, afflicted, and imprisoned, and to 
minister to him," in finding the sick, afflicted, and im- 
prisoned among men, and in ministering to them, 
whilst I have seen multitudes of Christians doing this 
work, I never yet have seen a Spiritualist doing it. 
Why will you, my brother, continue to palm off upon 
me what you have borrowed from Christianity for 
" the teachings of modern Spiritualism " ? 

20. Your twentieth reason is the " cap-sheaf." 

I respond, 1. The "living tests" of Spiritualism 
are worth nothing — for they prove nothing. 

2. I admit that "no other religion has" them, be- 
cause " no other religion " needs them. 

3. " Ministers " have seen them and do see them, 
and know that, though remarkable in some respects, 
they prove nothing good which is not better proved 
by Bible evidence. In fact they know these " living 
tests " prove nothing for any religion. 

As you have given twenty reasons for thinking 
Spiritualism better calculated to elevate humanity 
mentally, morally, and spiritually, I will now submit 
twenty reasons why I think Christianity is better cal- 
culated to effect those ends. 

1. Because it puts man under the highest authority 
— God. 

2. Because it offers to him a social relationship with 
God — " they shall be to me sons." 



38 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY? 

3. Because it teaches that there is such a thing as 
pardon; and as we desire it, so must we exercise it. 

4. Because it gives us all the true phenomena, of 
which those of modern Spiritualism are base imita- 
tions only, better certified, and more consonant with 
reason and necessity. 

5. Because it gives a social organization, in which 
all are equal, and, bound by the same ties, are under 
equal obligations to work for each other's good. 

6. Because it gives to every one the ideal man whose 
life was so holy, pure, and exalted, that a repetition of 
it in the lives of others must make them peculiarly 
holy, and always growing better. 

7. Because it gives a rule of life, speaking to all the 
same language, by which action may be tried, and thus 
performed or rejected, as determined to be right or 
wrong. 

8. Because it clearly declares a day in which the 
deeds of all shall be tried by an unerring standard, 
and rewarded and punished according to fact. 

9. Because it provides for an intelligent judgment, 
to be determined by an unerring judge. 

10. Because there is not a conceivable virtue which 
it does not enjoin, nor a vice which it does not in 
principle condemn. 

11. Because it expresses a sympathy felt for man ; 
and sympathy being the need of every natural being, 
and promotive of purity and spirituality, it is excel- 
lently calculated to elevate man. 

12. Because it teaches the principle of fellowship 
as nothing else ever did, by which the valuable and 
desirable acquisitions of one become the joint inherit- 
ance of every member of the body. 



Parker's second letter. 39 

13. Because it presents to every man an object of 
individual interest, and thus furnishes a bond attrac- 
tive to all ; and thus bringing all into one fraternity- 
it elevates all by elevating each one. 

14. Because, embracing so many documents in such 
a variety of languages, it necessitates the study of lan- 
guage and the cultivation of letters. 

15. Because it establishes a closer relationship be- 
tween us and God, it forms a link which binds us to 
nature as the work of God, and therefore truly be- 
comes the legitimate patron and prosecutor of science, 

— more science in Christianity than out of it, — and 
out of Christian nations science is hardly known. 

16. Because it advocates the principle of self-denial, 
out of which flows all reformation, and holds out in- 
centives to that superior to anything dreamed of in 
Spiritualism. 

17. Because it gives man a basis for faith superior 
to anything in Spiritualism. 

18. Because it gives us a better object of worship 

— the God and Father of Jesus Christ. 

19. Because it gives us memorials of which Spirit- 
ualism is totally barren. 

20. Because it gives us something which has stood 
the test of nearly nineteen hundred years, and de- 
monstrated its adaptation to the entire race. 

Hoping to hear from you again soon, and that you 
will bring out more clearly the better things of Spirit- 
ualism, I am, as ever, 

Affectionately yours, &c, 

W. F. Parker. 



40 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY ? 



MOSES HULL'S THIRD LETTER. 

Louisville, Ky., July 2, 1872. 

My good Brother : Yours of June 11 has this 
day fallen into my hands. Now that our correspond- 
ence is to develop into an epistolary discussion for the 
benefit of the multitude, I will try to let it take more 
the shape of a discussion, and will agree to limit the 
number of my letters to twelve, neither of which shall 
exceed ten pages of foolscap. And with this limitation 
it will hardly be possible for us to examine every argu- 
ment and assertion made by each other ; so, when I 
leave points in your letters unnoticed, I trust you will 
not attribute it to a lack of courtesy, but rather to the 
fact that I have matter for my space that seems to me 
more important. 

I. I am a little astonished that you should confess 
yourself "so pleased" with my ideas, that are "so 
totally out of the pale of truth." I must confess my- 
self better pleased with the few truthful ideas you 
have than the others. Yet I will go as far as I can 
with you. I am pleased with your mode of expressing 
even your untruthful ideas. 

II. I am truly pleased at your efforts to extend your 
fraternal feelings. It is magnanimous. What a man 
you would be if it were not for your religion ! In 
your first letter you say, "I am the brother of every 



hull's third letter. 41 

man for whom Jesus of Nazareth died." But in par- 
agraph marked L, in your second letter, you say, 
"Your supposition that I consider myself a brother 
only of a class for whom Jesus of Nazareth died is 
quite erroneous." My brother, "I accept the amend- 
ment." You are nearer the kingdom than you were 
when you wrote before'. 

III. And so you think that Jesus indorses my doc- 
trine, that every man does in a certain sense do the 
will of God. In this you are mistaken. While he 
acknowledges none as brothers only those who do the 
will of God, he emphatically denies that all do his 
will. Have you forgotten Jesus' Sermon on the 
Mount ? You could get instruction from it. Here 
is an extract: "Not every one that saith unto me, 
Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven, 
but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in 
heaven. Many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, 
have we not prophesied in thy name, and in thy name 
cast out devils, and in thy name done many wonder- 
ful works ? And then will I profess unto them, I never 
knew you; depart from me, ye that work iniquity." 
Matt. vii. 21-23. See also Luke vi. 46. You think 
Jesus' parentage, associates, and education were in- 
clined to be a hindrance to his fraternal feelings for 
all humanity. If Jesus had been only an ordinary 
man, that excuse would help the matter ; but as the 
third person in the Trinity, or the plenarily inspired 
Son of God, such surroundings should not have shrunk 
him to the dimensions manifested in some of his 
teachings. 

IV. You object to the texts I referred you to, to 
show that certain persons were to be cast into hell ; 



42 SPIRITUALISM OK CHRISTIANITY ? 

that " not a word is said about dogmas, propositions, 
or beliefs." Very well ; here are others. 

"He that believeth not shall be damned." Mark 
xvi. 16. 

"And for this cause God shall send them strong 
delusion that they should believe a lie, that they all 
might be damned who believed not the truth, but had 
pleasure in unrighteousness." 2 Thess. ii. 11, 12. 

In Rev. xxi. 8, unbelieving is classed with criminal 
offenses, and is a reason for casting certain ones into 
the lake of fire and brimstone. 

5. I am heartily glad you have read my little book, 
" Both Sides." A perusal of that and other such 
works will help you ; but you want proofs of the falli- 
bility of the inspiration of Bible prophets. You ac- 
knowledge that as men they were fallible. I am glad 
you see that they were made of the same material as 
other men, that if they were at times inspired, others 
may be, and if others err, they may. Some of these 
great men supposed their predictions had been ful- 
filled, but a reconsideration by wiser heads proved 
that they had not. Thus Joshua said, " Not one 
thing hath failed of all the good things which the Lord 
your God spake concerning you ; all are come to pass 
unto you, and not one thing hath failed thereof." 
Josh, xxiii. 14. On this subject the first Christian 
martyr differed widely with Joshua. Stephen's dying , 
words were, " And he gave him none inheritance in 
it, no, not so much as to set his foot on : Yet he 'prom- 
ised that he would give it to him for a possession, and 
to his seed after him7 when as yet he had no child." 
Acts vii. 5. See also, for a contradiction to this, 
Josh. xxi. 43-45. For proof that Moses was mistaken, 



hull's thikd letter. 43 

see his history of the creation, of making woman out 
of a man's rib, of the flood, the ark and its bill of 
lading, of Abraham chasing his enemies to a place 
that did not exist in his day. That he was morally a 
bad man, is proved by his commands to " spoil the 
Egyptians;" to deliver a stubborn, rebellious, glutton- 
ous, or drunken son up to death ; to put your own 
child to death for a difference of religious opinion ; to 
sell bad meat to strangers ; to buy, own, sell, and 
sometimes kill slaves; to exterminate male Midian- 
ites, and save alive females for themselves. Other 
points might be mentioned, but space forbids. For 
proof of each count in this indictment, see Gen. i. 
14-19, ii. 18-25, vi. and vii., whole chapters ; Gen. 
xiv. 14 ; Judges xviii. 29 ; Ex. xii. 35 ; Deut. xxi. 18 ; 
Deut. xiii. 6-9 ; Deut. xiv. 21 ; Lev. xxv. 44 ; Exod. 
xxi. 20 ; Num. xxxi. 17. 

If I were to walk naked, as Isaiah did, you would 
call it strong proof of fallibility. See Is. xx. 2-4. 
Jeremiah several times confessed that his inspirations 
deceived him. See Jer. xx. 7. 

VI. And so I have proved my insanity, instead of 
proving the similarity of modern spiritualism to an- 
cient manifestations ? "Well, that is a cheap way of 
meeting an argument. Whether it is effectual, our 
readers must judge. 

VII. What queer reasons you have for believing 
the Old and New Testaments true ? " The Old Testa- 
ment proves itself true, and consequently authorita- 
tive, in proving its author the Omniscient God." The 
Latins would call that a complete peiitio principii. 
Suppose the Old Testament proved the omniscient 
God to be its author ; would that make the quail 



44 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY? 

story, or Jonah and his whale story, true ? Would that 
make Ahaziah two years older than his father, or 
would it make it right for jou to bestow your money 
for wine, or for strong drink, or for whatsoever your 
soul lusts after ? Num. xii. 31 ; Jonah i. 17 ; 2 Chron. 
xxi. 20, 22, 23 ; Deut. xiv. 26. So far from the Old 
Testament having come from an Omniscient God, the 
God who figures in it always proved himself other- 
wise. He had to put a how in the cloud, lest he 
should forget that he had destroyed the world with a 
flood ! Gen. ix. 16. He had to come down to see the 
tower which the children of men builded. Gen. xi. 5. 
He could not believe the cities of Sodom and Go- 
morrah were so wicked until he came down to see 
whether the report that had reached him was true. 
Gen. xviii. 21. He could not tell whether Abraham 
feared him until he tested him. Gen. xxii. 12. 

I can not for my life see how Jesus being the son 
of God has anything to do with the truthfulness of 
the New Testament, for in your first section you 
acknowledge that we are all the offspring of God. 
Your argument would make all books authoritative 
and true. It is still more strange that both should be 
true. Is the Old Testament correct when it says, 
" An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth "? Then 
the New Testament is wrong when it says, " But I say 
unto you, that ye resist not evil." 

Your sixth paragraph convinces me that you mis- 
understood my first letter. 

VIII. I hardly expected, when you called on me for 
a " formulated statement," that you would notice it so 
slightly ; yet the fault was mine. Had I given the 
subject more thought, I would have seen that you 



hull's third letter. 45 

could do no better than you have. Where did 
" Christ give the first true ideas of the soul " ? Please 
give chapter and verse. My brother, since our 
friendly letters are taking the form of discussion, I 
would advise you to be careful of your statements. 
Then you deny that the soul is the highest authority ? 
Please in your next point me to a higher authority. 
Is not your soul the umpire by which you try every- 
thing, even the Bible ? I think it is. 

I hardly know how to understand your doctrine of 
pardon. On one point I know you are mistaken. 
Your quotation, " An eye for an eye, a tooth for a 
tooth, blood for blood," is from your own Bible. 
Please don't again commit the blunder of calling it 
Spiritualism. Your " Omniscient God," the author 
of the Old Testament, originated that saying. If there 
is a means to escape " the terrors of a deformed char- 
acter, then that means will incline people to deform 
their character and use the means. If pardon does 
not enable them to escape the deformity, then tell me 
what it does for man. 

So far as the " self-contradictory " phenomena, as- 
sertions, proofs, and logic of Spiritualism are concerned, 
they are self-contradictory, just as day contradicts 
night, the sun the rain, the heat the cold. The sun, by 
adding more light, does not contradict the moon. The 
small mind can see contradictions in all nature ; the 
large one sees harmony where others can only see 
chaos. 

IX. Your reply to my fifth proposition is so fully 
met in the proposition itself, that, until you meet that 
statement, I will "rest the case." I do not see how 
it is possible for any one to more thoroughly misun- 



46 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY? 

derstand anything than you have my sixth proposi- 
tion. Please read it again. I will not reply to argu- 
ments so evidently based on a misunderstanding. You 
have made the best hit on my seventh reason of any 
you have touched. Your words are, " I am not able to 
understand your seventh reason." If you had writ- 
ten that after each one of my propositions, you could 
have proved your assertion by the other statements 
you made with regard to them. I think, from your 
reply to my eighth proposition, you have adopted 
Universalism. Good : that is on the right road; only 
don't stop too long at that station. Christian physi- 
cians might help carry out my ninth argument, if it 
were not that their Christianity prevents their acknoivl- 
edging the truth, and applying the remedies for sin. 
The " Army of Faith " that you accuse me of taking 
my tenth proposition, " body and soul,' 1 from, I never 
heard of; would like to see it. If it has that much 
truth in it, it is ahead of ordinary Christian documents. 
Where did I teach a " universal salvation " ? Where 
did I teach a salvation at all, that would allow an 
individual to escape the consequence of his actions ? 

I am astonished that you should say, " Universal 
fellowship is one of the cardinal items of the gospel." 
I had understood Paul to say, " Be ye not unequally 
yoked together with unbelievers ; for what fellowship 
hath righteousness with unrighteousness, and what 
communion hath light with darkness ? " 2 Cor. vi. 
14. " From such withdraw thyself;" "From such 
turn away ; " and other like expressions are used in the 
New Testament to show that certain persons should 
not be fellowship ed. ■ 

X. Dr. McCosh's " Typical Forms in Creation " may 



hull's third letter. 47 

be good ; still I had rather you would have referred 
me to the passage of Scripture that proved my fif- 
teenth proposition, rather than to prove by Dr. McCosh 
that I had found its substance in the Bible. Your 
indorsement of my sixteenth reason is good ; but it 
was spoiled by your quotation from our " Luminary." 
Why did you not tell us who the ''luminary " was? 
Ah ! that would have spoiled the quotation, as our 
" luminary " would have turned out to be one of your 
allies. Yes, more than an ally of yours against Spirit- 
ualism, for I do not believe you would invent a lie 
against Spiritualism, and you knoiu he would. 

I am glad you have come to the conclusion, " that 
Moses and Joshua have recorded some things deroga- 
tory of the divine character." As you " are a nine- 
teenth century man," you will adopt the teachings of 
the present age, and leave Moses and Joshua where 
they belong. The world has advanced nearly three 
thousand years since their day ; let us " keep peace 
with the truth." I am glad to hear you acknowl- 
edge that the New Testament is an improvement on 
the Old Testament, which you inform me had "an 
Omniscient God for its author." 

I think you must have been nervous when you 
wrote your reply to my eighteenth reason. Does not 
the heat overcome you ? Are you not working too 
hard this hot weather ? Take care of your health. You 
have introduced the first " dung-god " I ever heard 
of. You are welcome to him. You know there is no 
accounting for tastes. 

II. You make several very fine quotations from the 
" Year Book," and seem to think it would be impossi- 
ble for us to adopt the "methods of the church 



48 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY? 

without adopting its doctrines." In this you are mis- 
taken. The southern army adopted, as far as possible, 
the methods of our northern army, but not its prin- 
ciples. 

XII. As your twenty statements are simply the 
converse of mine, our readers will find an abundant 
reply by re-reading my statements in the concluding 
part of my second letter. I will not now offer a 
further reply. 

XIII. Permit me to conclude this letter by giving a 
list of reasons why the teachings of the Old and New 
Testament Scriptures can not, in the first sense of the 
word, be morally elevating. 

1. They make good works only secondary in the 
development of manhood, urging other things as be- 
ing of more importance. Proof, Eph. ii. 8, 9 ; Rom. 
iii. 20, 27, 28. 

2. They love sin, and, in fact, make sin the founda- 
tion of all happiness. Proof, Rom. vi. 17 ; Luke vii. 47. 

3. Their best teacher did not himself know how to 
perform that which was right : how, then, can they 
teach the right to others ? Proof, Rom. vii. 14-25. 

4. They teach that a person may escape the conse- 
quences of sin. Proof, 1 John i. 7. 

5. They lead to war, rapine, and the shedding of 
blood. Proof, Num. xxxi. 1, 17 ; Jer. xlviii. 10 ; Joel 
iii. 10-14 ; Luke xxii. 36. 

6. They warn against education and philosophy. 
Proof, Eccl. i. 16-18, vii. 16 ; 1 Cor. xi. 1-4, 14, 38 ; 
Col. ii. 8. 

7. They urge men to hate and forsake their families. 
Proof, Matt. x. 34-38 ; Luke xiv. 26. 

8. They lead to intemperance. Proof, Deut. xiv. 
26 ; Prov. xxxi. 6 ; 1 Tim. v. 23. 



parkee's third lettee. 49 

A want of space has prevented quoting the Scrip- 
tures to which I have referred. 

Hoping for an early response, and that truth may be 
the gainer, as the result of this agitation of thought, 
I subscribe myself, not only fraternally, but 
Controversially yours, 

Moses Hull. 



W. F. PARKER'S THIRD REPLY. 

Cedar Hill, near La Grange, Kt., > 
July 8, 1872. > 

Brother Hull : Your third epistle reached me 
this morning, and, as usual, I promptly respond. 

I. You seem to conclude that you must now suffer 
our " correspondence to develop into an epistolary dis- 
cussion for the benefit of the multitude." Well, I 
am glad of it, as you doubtlessly will now buckle on 
your armor and come up to your contest with the 
Bible with courage and effectiveness. Up to this 
time I have failed to see the strength, or " merit of 
your cause." And so inconclusive and unfortunate 
have been your assaults upon the fortifications of my 
faith in Christianity, that really, unless you do much 
better in your remaining nine letters, I shall be forced 
to believe that modern Spiritualism is a greater delu- 
sion than I had imagined. You desired to convert me 
to the " Harmonial Philosophy." To do this you 
kindly wrote me, and placed before me some of your 
objections to the Bible and Christianity. I supposed 
you would lay before my mind something which would 
4 



50 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY? 

deserve serious consideration, and something, too, 
which might dispose me to reject the " ancient faith." 
I am further from Spiritualism than ever. I can not 
tell how great a distance I shall yet have placed be- 
tween me and that ; but certainly I see no prospect 
of anything less than an "infinite distance." Still, 
as you now conclude to descend into the arena of 
" discussion," I suppose I shall have to feel your ath- 
letic blows as the champion of the Harmonial cause. 
Please give us henceforth your strength. Come to 
the point. Prove to me that spiritualistic writers are 
better than Bible writers ; that spiritualistic ivritings 
are better calculated to make good, happy, prosperous 
men than Bible writings; that spiritualistic facts are 
better facts, better in their moral, intellectual, and do- 
mestic bearings, than the facts of Bible history ; in fact, 
prove to me that Spiritualism has one gcocl thing in it 
which is not better found in the Bible or Christianity. 

II. Of course, when you wrote me your last letter, 
you did not expect me to notice a large part of it. So 
I will let many items pass to the "jury" without fur- 
ther remark. 

III. I shall notice your third item. You say, " And 
so you think Jesus indorses my doctrine, that every 
man does, in a certain sense, do the will of God." No, 
I did not, and now do not say it. Please read that 
paragraph again. 

Nor did I say that Jesus was influenced by his 
"parentage, associates, and education," so as to affect 
" his fraternal feelings for all humanity." I think, on 
another reading of that passage, you will find that I 
said that Jesus entertained those fraternal feelings for 
humanity, in spite of his surroundings; which fact 



paekee's third letter. 51 

proves Jesus to have been beyond the laws by which 
every other person has been prepared for his work in 
life. You can not find in the surroundings of Jesus 
anything which can account for his character, teach- 
ings, and power. Try it. 

IV. As to your fourth item, your proof texts do 
not prove your proposition at all. The gospel is not 
a "dogma." It is the revelation of -a true life; it is 
the manifestation of a true life ; it is an exemplification 
of a true life ; and if your life and mine be not the 
true life, then, according to your own showing, eternal 
punishment is the inevitable doom. Herein is the 
overwhelming advantage of Christianity over Spirit- 
ualism. The former in its facts does give us the true 
life ; the latter, up to this time, has not yet been able 
to tell even what a true life is ; for the true life of one 
Spiritualist is the false life of another Spiritualist : all 
is dreamy, confused, dark, and totally unsatisfactory. 

V. As to your fifth item, I deem it worth while to 
notice briefly a few points. 

1. You fail utterly to show that one of the prophets, 
who " spoke as they were moved, by the Holy Ghost," 
ever failed to foretell the truth verified by history. 

2. You try to convince me and " the multitude " 
that certain of the Bible men were mistaken as to the 
fact in their teaching. You quote Joshua as say- 
ing, " Not one thing hath failed of all the good 
things which the Lord your God spake concerning 
you; all are come to pass unto you, and not one 
thing hath failed thereof." Josh, xxiii. 14. Now, to 
prove Joshua a liar, and consequently the Bible false, 
you parade before me Acts vii. 5, "And he gave 
him none inheritance in it ; no, not so much as to set 



52 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY ? 

foot on. Yet he promised that he ivould give it to him 
for a possession, and to his seed after him, when as yet 
he had no child." 

Did you not know, my brother, when you collated 
those two passages, that you were perverting the rec- 
ord ? Joshua was speaking of one thing ; Stephen 
of another. Joshua was speaking of the promises of 
God to the Hebrews ; Stephen of the promise of God 
to Abraham. Alas for the cause which must be bol- 
stered up by such logic ! 

God did give the land to .Abraham for a possession. 
As a gift, the land was Abraham's, notwithstanding 
the fact that at that time he was unable to enjoy it. 
His seed did enjoy it. And it is universally recognized 
to-day as the Jews' land, notwithstanding it has been 
trodden down of the Gentiles for more than eighteen 
centuries. You, therefore, are wrong again, and the 
Bible is right. 

VI. As to the counts of your indictment, in which 
you imagine you array many damaging things against 
the Old Testament, I shall submit against you the 
words of one, who, in the Harmonial school, stands 
as " a shining light," and whose decisions are by very 
many accepted as unquestionable. I allude to Emma 
Hardinge. In a speech delivered January 2, 1870, at 
Harmonial Hall, Philadelphia, she says, " In the life 
of the Jewish lawgiver we find an especial mission to 
proclaim an external law, so perfect, so admirable, that 
every form of life teas provided for. It was perfect in 
its kind, wise, practical, and strictly adapted to . . • 
every description of morality. . . . Hence you per- 
ceive the strict necessity for such laws. . . . All 
the justice between man and man that was necessary 



parker's third letter. 53 

for strict order in social, commercial, and national life, 
are fully laid down." Thus, by the words of Spirit- 
ualist Emma Hardinge, are the words of Spiritualist 
Moses Hull condemned. You have not progressed to 
her sphere. 

VII. You seem considerably puzzled over the two 
reasons which I gave you for believing the Bible a 
divine book. I do not wonder. Were you as familiar 
as I am with the fullness of those reasons, you would 
cease trying to persuade men to reject the Bible. Of 
course I shall not give you in this correspondence an 
exposition of those reasons. You may learn their 
meaning pretty well, if you will take the trouble to 
read Walter Scott's "Great Demonstration." I dare 
say a candid, thoughtful reading of that valuable book 
will open your eyes to many of the excellences of 
Christianity with which you now seem to be totally 
unacquainted. 

VIII. You charge upon me the misunderstanding 
of your statements. Perhaps I did misunderstand 
you. I tried hard to get your meaning ; and I think 
I got it. I am more obtuse than I desire to be. I can 
not help it, however, and trust that in future you will 
write so perspicuously as to enable me to apprehend 
your meaning, certainly after the third reading. But 
if I misunderstood you, why did you not, in your last 
letter, tell me just what you did mean ? I submit 
your points and my rejoinders to the jury — the " mul- 
titude " for whom we write. 

IX. I perceive you feel the disastrous effect of 
my few words on your " eighteenth reason." I see you 
are ashamed of the Pantheism which you would sub- 
stitute for Bible Deism. You blush. There is hope 



54 SPIRITUALISM OH CHRISTIANITY? 

for one on whoso cheek can glow the " mantling 
blush of shame." My brother, why do you not show 
me by fact, by logic, that Pantheism is better than 
Theism ? What logic is there in this style of writ- 
ing — "Are you not working too hard this hot 
weather? Take care of your health." You make 
God matter, and all matter God. Dung is matter; 
hence dung is God — according to your advanced 
" ideas." Get out of it, if you can. 

X. You say, " As your twenty statements are the 
converse of mine," &c. Now, that is dispatching 
things in a hurry. I do not think — neither will any 
intelligent man think — that a "re-reading of" your 
" statements " will be enough to destroy the force of 
my twenty reasons for preferring Christianity to Spir- 
itualism. I did show that your reasons for preferring 
Spiritualism were mostly borrowed from the Bible. 
The only excellences of which you can boast as com- 
mending your philosophy, are excellences which do 
not belong to your philosophy. Do you not know it ? 
Now, in return, show me where I have borrowed any- 
thing from the religion and philosophy which I repu- 
diate. 

You did not see fit. to attack those twenty reasons, 
because you were conscious that they embody nothing 
but truth. 

XI. I will now attend to your "list of reasons 
why the teachings of the Old and New Testament 
Scriptures can not, in the first sense of the Avord, be 
morally and mentally elevating." * 

1. You say, " They make good works only sec- 
ondary in the development of manhood, urging other 
things as being of more importance. Proof, Eph. ii. 
8, 9 ; Rom. iii. 20, 27, 28." 



55 

To which I respond, — 

1st. The Scriptures do no such thing 

1. You have quoted the only passages in the Bible 
which can he tortured into the support of your error. 

2. In Eph. ii. 8, 9, Paul says not a word about 
44 good works " being "secondary" to anything "in 
the development of manhood." 

3. But in the tenth verse he says, "For we are 
his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus, UNTO GOOD 
works, which God hath before ordained, that we shoidd 
walk in them." 

4. In Rom. hi. 20, 27, 28, the phrase, "good works" 
is not once found. Hence your ''proof" is no proof. 

5. Jesus taught his disciples always that to do good 
is the design of human being. 

2d. The apostles invariably inculcated the same 
doctrine. 

1. This is proved by their constant presenting of 
Christ, "who went about doing good;" their exhor- 
tations " to walk in his steps ; " and the "good works," 
enumerated and enjoined by specific commandments, 
as well as by the fact that eternal life was to be 
possessed and enjoyed on condition of " patient con- 
tinuance in %v ell doing." 

Hence your first " reason " is dissipated. 

2. You say, " They love sin ; in fact, make sin 
the foundation of all happiness." Proof, Rom. v. 17 ; 
Luke vii. 4, 7. 

My brother, I fear you wrote these words without 
reflection. They state either an awful truth or a 
most base and detestable error. No middle ground is 
possible. Did you expect me to believe your state- 
ment ? I fear not. Still, as you refer to two passages 



56 SPIRITUALISM OK CHRISTIANITY? 

of Scripture for proof, I will try to think that you 
suppose your words to have a partial basis of truth. 

Your statement is not true, for the following 
reasons : — 

1st. Your proof texts do not give a shadow of 
ground on which to base the affirmation. 

1. You refer to Rom. v. 17, which reads, " For, if 
by one man's offense death reigned by one, much 
more they which receive abundance of grace, and of 
the gift of righteousness, shall reign in life by one, 
Jesus Christ." 

You know that this passage is far, very far from 
teaching that the " Scriptures " u love sin," and 
make " it the foundation of all happiness." 

2. Your other text, Luke vii. 4, 7, does not contain 
a word concerning sin at all. 

3. The Scriptures of the Old and New Testament 
in every sentiment condemn sin, and teach that sin is 
the foundation of all misery. 

1st. They represent God — 

1. As hating all sin. 

2. As angry with the wicked every day. 

3. As destroying the species by a flood because of 
sin. 

4. As inflicting death, temporal and eternal, on 
account of sin. 

5. As manifesting, in every possible way, "the 
exceeding sinfulness of sin." 

6. As holding out all kinds of motives to win men 
from sins. 

7. As devising glorious means to save all men from 
sins. 

2d. They represent prophets, &c, as describing the 



Parker's third letter. 57 

• 
horrid features of sin ; as pleading against it ; as de- 
nouncing judgment for it ; as crushing it in their own 
lives ; and as endeavoring, by all legitimate means, to 
make it exceedingly repulsive to all men. 

3d. They represent Christ as going even to the ex- 
tent of death to condemn it. 

4th. They represent the apostles as preaching 
against it ; mortifying it in their own bodies ; and as 
teaching the inevitably destructive consequences of 
following it. 

5th. History represents the primitive disciples as 
loathing it, and abandoning, it as the fountain of all 
earthly calamities, and the sure token of " everlasting 
punishment." 

Hence your second reason is proved a baser figment 
than your first. 

Now, what you charge on the Bible as teaching 
concerning sin is actually the teaching of modern 
Spiritualism on that subject. 

1. Spiritualistic documents teach me that " what- 
ever is, is right." Sin is ; therefore it is right. 
Hence to sin is to do right. 

2. They teach me that "all actions are morally 
alike." 

3. They teach me that " sin is essential to devel- 
opment." 

4. They teach me that "drunkards, liars, prosti- 
tutes, &c, occupy higher spheres in the other world 
than do those who have not been disciplined by 
crime." 

5. The}? - teach me that "man is no more respon- 
sible for his actions than for the color of his hair." 

6. They teach me that " to obey the appetites, and 



58 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY? 

yield to the impulses of the flesh, is to secure the 
highest earthly pleasure, and to be as good as to deny 
ourselves these indulgences, and devote our lives to 
piety." 

These are a few of the teachings of your Harmo- 
nial religion on the subject of sin. You know these 
things are taught in books, pamphlets, and papers. 
You can not find a sentiment like them in the Bible. 

7. Your third reason, for want of space and time, 
which I can better use, I will allow to go to the jury 
with its pretended proof. 

8. You say, " They teach that a person may escape 
the consequences of his sin. Proof, 1 John i. 7." 

1st. You will persist in giving only the place where 
your proofs can be found. Why do you not quote 
the words on which you depend ? Is it because you 
know that the large majority of your readers will not 
take the trouble to examine the passages to which you 
refer, but take for granted that they teach what you 
say they teach, because you tell only where they may 
be found? 

2d. Any one consulting the passage quoted will see, 

1. That the " consequences of sin " are not found 
in the text. 

2. That u walking in the light " — by which the 
apostle means pure, holy, faithful living — is the 
condition of the fraternal communion, and the effi- 
cacy of "the blood" to cleanse or deliver from all 
sin, or unholy actions. So much for your text. The 
doctrine alleged is not found in it. 

8. But the Bible teaches, as I have proved in one 
of my former letters, that the consequences of sin 
will overtake the transgressor. 



PARKER'S THIRD LETTER. 59 

Spiritualism is guilty of holding out inducements to 
sin, by assuring men that there are no grounds to fear 
the consequences of evil actions. This point I have 
already proved in this letter. In further proof I will 
quote from a spiritual revelation, as given to the 
world in the Banner of Light. " God is just ; and 
the punishment which comes in this world is enough 
for anybody. So mother may be perfectly at rest, 
and feel that, however hard her lot is here, it is the 
hardest part of life. Of course we have some evils 
there, but compared with the evils you suffer here, 
they are nothing. You can skim over them as lightly 
as over smooth ice, &c. Don't forget my name. 
Rose Gerry. Mar. 6." 

There are other revelations, which declare that 
penalties for crimes in this world are unknown in the 
world beyond. 

.Perhaps these are Universalist spirits, who are still 
in the " first sphere." 

It is true that other spirits contradict these revela- 
tions, and declare that there is a " hell " for crimes 
committed on earth. For instance, Thomas H. At- 
kinson, in his message from the "other side," says, 
" So I went into the other world with a double stain 
upon my spirit, and I would not pretend to say I did 
not go to hell ; that I did not suffer all that was neces- 
sary for my spirit to suffer. . . . I went to hell, and 
paid the penalty therefor." Who is right, Rose 
Gerry or Thomas H. Atkinson ? Such is what mod- 
ern Spiritualism gives us ! 

" If in your new estate you can not rest, 
But must return, O, grant us this request: 
Come with a noble and celestial air, 
And prove your titles to the names you bear; 



60 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY? 

Give some clear token of your heavenly birth; 
Write as good English as you wrote on earth ; 
And — what were once superfluous to advise — 
Don't tell, I beg you, such egregious lies." — Saxe. 

4. You say, " They lead to war, rapine, and the 
shedding of blood. Proof, Numb. xxxi. 1, 17 ; Jer. 
xviii. 10 ; Joel iii. 10, 14 ; Luke xxii. 36." 

1st. Numb. xxxi. 1, 7. 

1. God ? s command to Moses to avenge the Jews 
on the Midianites, is not held forth as an example to 
be followed by any person on earth. 

2. This was done long before the greatest part of 
the Scriptures had an existence. 

3. It was not done in consequence of the teachings 
of the Scriptures at all. A child can see that. 

2d. Jer. xviii. 10. "If it do evil in my sight, that 
it obey not my voice, then I will repent of the good, 
wherewith I said I would benefit them." 

1. Nothing said of " war." 

2. Nothing said of " rapine." 

3. Nothing said of " the shedding of blood." 
Hence nothing said for your cause. 

3d. Joel iii. 10, 14. 

1. It is a prophecy of war amongst the Gentiles. 

2. Not a soul on earth ever attempted " war, rap- 
ine, and the shedding of blood," because that proph- 
ecy is found in the Bible. 

3. Not an intelligent Bible reader on earth sup- 
poses that passage to justify "war, rapine, and the 
shedding of blood for any cause." 

How unfortunate your references ! 

4. Luke xxii. 36. 

" Then he said unto them, But now, he that hath a 



parker's third letter. 61 

purse, let him take it, and likewise his scrip ; and he 
that hath no sword, let him sell his garment, and buy 
one." . . . " And they said, Lord, behold, here are 
two swords. And he said unto them, It is enough." 

Were these two swords for " war," "rapine," and 
" the shedding of blood " ? If so, why did this same 
teacher shortly after say, " Put up thy sword. He 
that useth the sword shall perish by the sword " ? 

I say, concerning this point, " It is enough." 

5. You say, " They warn against education and 
philosophy. Proof, Eccl. i. 16, 18 ; vii. 16 ; 1 Cor. 
xi. 1, 4, 14, 38 ; Col. iv. 8." 

1st. Eccl. i. 16, 18. 

" I communed with mine own heart, saying, Lo, I 
am come to great estate, and have gotten more wis- 
dom than all they that have been before me in Jeru- 
salem; yea, my heart had great experience of wis- 
dom and knowledge. For in much wisdom is much 
grief ; and he that increaseth knowledge increaseth 
sorrow." 

If those words " warn against education and phi- 
losophy," I am unable to see it. They do teach that 
education, or wisdom, is not the chief good, — that 
thing which satisfies the longings of the soul. They 
do teach, in connection with other passages, that in- 
tellectua] culture can not bring peace to the spirit 
without religion. 

Turn to the book of Proverbs, by the same author, 
and you hear him exhorting all to "get wisdom, get 
understanding.' ' "Wisdom is the principal thing; 
therefore get wisdom ; and with all thy getting, get 
understanding (knowledge)." "Take fast hold of 
instruction ; let her not go : keep her ; for she is thy 



62 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY? 

life." Prov. iv. In the light of such passages, and 
they can be wonderfully multiplied, how dare you say, 
" They warn against education and philosophy " ? 
2d. 1 Cor. xi. 1, 4, 14, 38. 

1. In the first verse, neither education nor philos- 
ophy is mentioned; hence not forbidden. 

2. The same is true of the 4th verse. 

3. The same is true of the 14th verse. 

4. There is no 38th verse in the 11th chapter. 
Perhaps you intend the 14, 38, to refer to the 14th 

chapter, 38th verse: "But if any man be ignorant, 
let him be ignorant." The correct rendering, from 
the Greek used by Paul, is this : " But if any man re- 
fuse this acknowledgment, let him refuse it at his 
peril." Hence is swept away another of your errors. 
See Conybeare and Howson's Life and Epistles of St. 
Paul, page 453. 

3d. Col. iv. 8. 

" Whom I have sent unto you for the same purpose, 
that he might know your estate, and comfort your 
hearts." 

What has this verse to say about " education and 
philosophy? " 

What do you mean by trying thus to mislead the 
"multitude " ? I dare say, from this time forth, the 
multitude will hardly credit the pertinency and con- 
clusiveness of your laconic "proofs." 

4th. Your statement is proved false by the follow- 
ing facts : — 

1. Jesus was a teacher who taught the best philos- 
ophy the world ever heard, and labored three years 
to educate a few sound teachers for humanity. 

2. So well educated were the apostles, that, though 



63 

they have left behind them sundry writings, you can 
not find one error in all their spoken or written pro- 
ductions. 

3. Paul was finely educated in Tarsus, and in the 
Gamalielan College of Jerusalem. 

4. He never denounced his classical and literary 
acquirements as evil or useless. 

5. He was anxious to have his manuscripts always 
at hand. And when he desired one of his ministers 
to bring him his cloak for winter, he desired " spe- 
cially the parchments." 

6. He desired Timothy to give attention to " read- 
ing," and to " study," &c. 

7. Peter commands the primitive disciples to add 
" to virtue, knoivledge." 

8. The best teachers, during the early centuries, 
were Christians. 

9. The best schools of the early centuries were 
Christian schools. 

10. In all lands where the Bible has gone, schools, 
colleges, universities, have invariably followed. 

11. In this Christian country there are more col- 
leges under church patronage than you will find in all 
the world where the Bible is not acknowledged as 
the Book of God. 

12. Now, if the Bible "warned against education 
and philosophy," you would not see Christians so un- 
reservedly devoted to learning and the arts. 

Thus is swept wholly away your sixth error con- 
cerning the Bible. 

7. You say, " They urge men to hate and forsake 
their families. Proof, Matt. x. 34-38 ; Luke xiv. 26." 

Matt. x. 34-38. 



64 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY? 

1. The words on which you rely in this reference 
are these : " He that loveth father or mother more 
than me is not worthy of me ; and he that loveth 
son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me." 

2. Not one word said about hating and forsaking 
one's family. 

3. Jesus says, " He that loveth " the family " more 
than me is not worthy of me." He simply requires, 
in these words, that he shall share the love given to 
kindred. Love your kindred with devotion, but love 
me no less, is his idea. 

2. Luke xiv. 26. 

" If any man come to me, and hate not his father, 
and mother, and wife, and children, and brethren, 
and sisters, yea, and his own life also, he can not be 
my disciple." 

1. The word " hate " does occur in the passage. 

2. Kindred also are mentioned. Hence you have 
given one text which looks like " proof." 

3. But is It proof? 

1. Compare these words with all the other teachings 
of Jesus, and it is evident that he does not enjoin 
"hate," in our sense of the word. 

2. Compare them with his own life, and especially 
his own devotion to his mother and kindred, and the 
improbability that he intended to teach what you 
affirm of the words becomes still greater. 

3. Remember, 1. That he commanded his disciples 
to teach others what he had commanded them to 
observe. 

2. That his disciples did do so. 

3. That never did a disciple intimate the doctrine 
you allege ; and, 



BABBLER'S THIRD LETTER. 65 

4. That the disciples have positively, fully, and 
unequivocally taught and enjoined the contrary doc- 
trine ; as, 

" Husbands, love your wives." 

" Children, obey your parents." 

" Let the husband love his wife as his own body, 
for no man ever yet hated his own flesh, but nourish- 
eth and cherisheth it. . . ." Eph. v. 29. 

" Nevertheless, let every one of you in particular 
so love his wife even as himself; and the wife see 
that she reverence her husband." Eph. v. 33. 

Much more might be added, but " it is enough." 

Thus perishes your seventh error concerning the 
Bible. 

N. B. What you erroneously affirm concerning 
the Bible is true when affirmed of Spiritualism. 

Proof. 1. Moses Hull, in " Love and Marriage," 
page 14. 

2. Frances Barry, in the " Universe "for July 3, 1869. 
" Twenty-three years ago I pronounced popular mar- 
riage a system of legalized adultery and prostitution. 
Since then I have done what little I could to oppose 
and hold up to public contempt the corruption and tyr- 
anny of the accursed system. . . . Marriage is 

TO BE CONSIGNED TO ITS GBAVE." 

3. Mrs. Corbin. " Marriage ... is simply an 
abomination before God." 

4. "Light from the Spirit World." "The mar- 
riage institution of man is wrong, and must be an- 
nulled." 

5. J. M. Spear. " Cursed be the marriage institu- 
tion ; cursed be the relation of husband and wife ; 
cursed be all who would sustain legal marriage." 

5 



66 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY? 

And an infinite abundance of the same kind of 
spite against the family institution. 

" It is enough." 

The end is reached. 

6. Finally you say, "They lead to intemperance. 
Proof, Deut. xiv. 26 ; Prov. xxxi. 6 ; 1 Tim. v. 23." 

1st. Deut. xiv. 26. " Thou shalt bestow thy money 
. . . for wine or for strong drink." 

1. This gives the Jews the privilege to buy " wine " 
or " strong drink." 

2. The principle which the same law applies to 
prevent excess or abuse in other privileges applies 
here ; and nothing more is granted than a rational, 
temperate use of " wine," or " strong drink." 

3. If the privilege to purchase these things had 
been denied, Spiritualists would have charged it upon 
the Jiatefulness of the " base, wicked spirit of a dead 
man " — Jehovah. 

Alas, my brother ! 
2d. Prov. xxxi. 6. 

" Give strong drink unto him that is ready to per- 
ish, and wine unto those that be of heavy hearts." 

1. After what is said above, nothing more need be 
added here. 

2. No drunkard was ever made because of these 
words. 

3. Those who study these proverbs the most dili- 
. gently, and practice them the most carefully, — the 

Jews, — never are found amongst drunkards. Though 
I have seen thousands of Jews, I never yet saw one 
affected by an intemperate use of " wine or strong 
drink" 

3d. 1 Tim. v. 23. 



parker's third letter. 67 

" Drink no longer water, but use A little wine 
for thy stomach's sake and often infirmities." 

1. In granting the use of " a little wine," the use 
of much, i. e., intemperance, is prohibited. 

2. Its use was granted on account of disease, not 
to encourage drunkenness. 

3. A privilege given to one man is no reason why 
another man should claim it and abuse it. 

Hence expires your last error concerning the Bible. 
But the Bible teaches us that intemperance is hate- 
ful in God's sight. 

1. It teaches the subtle and destructive tendencies 
of intemperance. 

2. It denounces curses upon drunkenness. 

3. It declares that " no drunkard can enter into 
the kingdom of God." 

4. " Drunkenness " is classed amongst the " works 
of the flesh," with adultery, hatred, murder, and 
idolatry, and as such discouraged and denounced. 

5. Christians who read Paul's letters to Timothy 
most are known to be of all men least inclined to in- 
temperance, which would not be the case if your 
affirmation were true. 

N. B. What you erroneously charge upon the 
Bible I can prove true of Spiritualism, and will do so 
if you desire it. I would do so here, if my letter had 
not already reached an almost unpardonable length. 

Let us write shorter letters in future. 

Give us fewer points, and better fortified, so that I 
can get after your logic, and expose it in briefer space. 

Hurry up your response, and accept my kindest 
regards, as your friend, 

W. F. Parker. 



68 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY ? 



MOSES HULL'S FOURTH LETTER. 

Lafayette, Ind., July 13, 1872. 

Brother Parker: Yours of the 8th instant is 
here. It is said, " Brevity is the soul of wit." I will 
try to put more soul into this than in former articles. 

I. Permit me, before entering upon the review of 
your article, to correct the errors that my copyist made, 
or you made in reading my article. 

1. In paragraph X. you quote me, " They (the Old 
and New Testaments) love sin, in fact make sin the 
foundation of all happiness. Proof, Rom. v. 17 ; Luke 
vii. 47." Then you quote Rom. v. 17, and fail to see 
the connection between that and the thing I designed 
to prove. I am not astonished. My proof text was 
Rom. vi. 17. The text reads as follows : " But God be 
thanked that ye were the servants of sin ; but ye obeyed 
from the heart that form of doctrine which was de- 
livered unto you." This text, you will see, thanks 
God for sin. 

2. I quoted Jer. xlviii. to prove that the Bible 
leads to war, &c. In your reply you quoted Jer. 
xviii. 10, instead of xlviii. 10. The text to which I 
referred reads as follows : " Cursed be he that keep- 
eth back his sword from blood." This will enable 
you to discover that you were shooting at the wrong 
mark. 

3. I quoted Col. ii. 8, to prove that the Bible is op- 



69 



posed to philosophy. In your reply you quote Col. 
iv. 8. The text I used to prove the Bible opposed to 
philosophy reads as follows: "Beware lest any man 
spoil you through philosophy and vain deceit, after 
the tradition of men, and not after Christ." 

These three innocent errors have made me appear 
ridiculous, and cost you a great many useless words. 
We will try to avoid such mistakes in the future. 

II. In your first paragraph, after asserting that 
Spiritualism is a delusion, you ask me to prove that 
spiritualistic writers are better than Bible writers ; 
that spiritualistic writings are better calculated to 
make good, happy, prosperous men than Bible writ- 
ers; tha.t spiritualistic facts are better facts, &c. 

1. Suppose I can not prove anything you ask of 
me ; suppose our writers were no better, our facts no 
better — would that weigh against Spiritualism, or in 
favor of the Bible ? Certainly not. The Bible writers 
may have been exactly the writers needed at that 
time, the biblical facts just the facts demanded by the 
times ; but are they adapted to this age ? How can 
you or I be benefited by Noah's moral character, let 
him have been as pure as an angel, and the command 
to build an ark have come from heaven. Let the fact 
of the flood be a fact, how can you and I be benefited 
by it? 

2. We want present truth, the truth of to-day, 
given under the inspiration of to-day. Should our in- 
spiration of to-day be no better, or not so good, as the 
past, it is better for us, because it is ours. 

3. If you could prove that our rain is not so wet, 
our dew not so gentle, nor spring showers so genial, 
as those of Abraham, I would nevertheless argue that 



70 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY? 

our rain, sun, and dew are better for us, will raise 
better corn, wheat, and potatoes, than we could if we 
were to shut our fields away from these blessings, and 
send an agent to read the history of Abrahamic rain, 
sun, and dew, to them. 

4. Our spiritualistic writers certainly can be no 
worse than the bloodthirsty robber who is said to have 
written the first five books of your Bible. Joshua 
and Samuel were both murderers, and Samuel was a 
fortune-teller. If our spiritualistic writers are not 
morally ahead of David and Solomon, they certainly 
could not be worse. As for Paul's moral character, 
you yourself would not defend it "before he became a 
Christian ; and after that he becomes all things to all 
men. 1 Cor. ix. 22. Quarreled with Barnabas and 
Peter. Acts xv. 39 ; Gal. ii. 11-14. Went to Jeru- 
salem. Acts ix. 26. Afterward denied going there. 
Gal. i. 17. Preached against circumcision. Gal. v. 2. 
And yet practiced it. Acts xvi. 3. He committed 
the double dealing of preaching to the Gentiles a salva- 
tion without obedience to the law, and yet, when he 
went among the Jews, purified himself according to 
the law. Acts xxi. 18-21, 26, 27. Then afterward 
denied it, and declared the Jews could not prove it. 
Acts xxiv. 12. More derelictions in the characters of 
Bible writers might be given, but my space to me is 
precious. I submit that our inspired media can not 
be worse. 

III. I believe I will allow you the last word intro- 
duced in paragraphs II. and III., except that I will say 
that Jesus' doctrine was pure, unadulterated Egyptian- 
ism. His surroundings, when his father took him down 
into Egypt, were calculated to develop the very senti- 



hull's fourth letter. 71 

merits he uttered, as well as to lead to the mode of 
life he lived. 

IV. You deuy that the gospel is a dogma, and 
assert that "it is the revelation of a true life," &c. 
Will you live the true life preached in the gospel? 
Please obey the Sermon on the Mount. Abandon 
public prayer ! Matt. vi. 25-31. Please give your 
cloak to the one who sues you and takes your coat ! 
Go two miles with the one who compels you to go 
one. Carry out that principle in all things — will you ? 
If you do not, remember eternal punishment is your 
doom ! You can not see how the true life of one 
Spiritualist should be the false life of another. I can. 
Can you see how or why one individual should re- 
quire sleep, and another at the same time wakeful- 
ness ? Or why, at the same time, one should require 
rest and another exercise ? If so, you may yet de- 
velop to where you can see how the true life of one 
Spiritualist may be the false life of another. 

V. You say that I " failed to show that one of the 
prophets, who spoke as they were moved by the Holy 
Ghost, ever failed to foretell the truth, verified hy his- 
tory." I hardly know how to take that — whether you 
meant to deny that the prophets were moved by the 
Holy Ghost, or whether you intended to argue that 
biblical predictions were all fulfilled. 

If you wish to show the fulfillment of prophecy, 
please point me to the history of the fulfillment of 
Jonah hi. 4 : " Yet forty days and Nineveh shall be 
overthrown." I will ask you another question. Can 
you show me one biblical prophecy that met a fulfill- 
ment in every point ? You forgot to tell me how it 
happened that Abraham chased his enemies to Dan 



72 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY? 

more than four hundred years before it was built. I 
perceive that, although you think that Joshua was 
right in saying that " not one thing hath failed of all 
the good things which the Lord your God hath prom- 
ised," you are willing to think that Stephen told the 
truth when he referred to the failure of the promise 
made to Abraham. Though he promised that he 
would give the land to him and his seed, he gave him 
" none inheritance in it, no, not so much as to set his 
foot on." So I was not wrong, after all. 

But you spoil it all. You say in the next sentence, 
" God did give the land to Abraham for a, possession." 
You are probably correct ! Stephen was mistaken ! 
He says, " And he gave him none inheritance in it, 
no, not so much as to set his foot on." You acknowl- 
edge that "for eighteen hundred years the land has 
been trodden down of the Gentiles." Yet it was 
given to Abraham and his seed for an everlasting pos- 
session. 

VI. Your quotation from Emma Hardinge, when 
taken in its connection, is possibly a good thing. Mrs. 
Hardinge does say many fine things, yet in point of 
progress she falls fearfully in the rear. I think she 
to-day belongs in the church with you more than with 
the reformers. She has ever made a studied effort 
to hitch her Spiritualism on to Christianity, even going 
so far as to get married in the church. To this no 
Spiritualist would object. Our only objection is, that 
she should be quoted as a representative Spiritualist in 
its differences from Christianity. She could be more 
appropriately quoted as a representative Christian. 

VII. I was in hopes you would prove your two 
reasons for believing the Bible divine, rather than 



hull's fourth lettee. 73 

boast of your familiarity with them. Your familiarity 
with them I will not deny. I have known people to be 
familiar with a good many silly things. Walter Scott's 
" Great Demonstration" may exactly do the work. I 
think our readers would prefer that you would do it. 
Walter Scott may demonstrate that white is black, or 
that twice two are five : either proposition is as easily 
demonstrated as your two reasons for believing the 
Bible divine. 

VIII. Your eighth point demands no reply. 

IX. Your ninth is an effort to induce me to worship 
your " dung God." As I have said nothing on the 
dung God question, " I pray thee have me excused." 
" O, come, let us worship." Not any, I thank you. 
Leave me out ! 

X. As you persist in urging me to notice your 
twenty points of superiority of Christianity over Spirit- 
ualism, I will devote a little space to them. 

1. "It puts men under the highest authority — 
God." 

Does not Spiritualism put men under the authority 
of God ? It does. Christianity does not put a man 
under the authority of God, but under a man-made 
Bible. Let a man attempt to obey God in violation 
of the Bible and you would turn him out of the church. 

2. Spiritualism offers the same " social relations," 
urging that the spirit is the direct " offspring of 
God." 

3. If the gospel teaches pardon in any sense that 
will allow the culprit to escape the consequences of 
his sins, that is against, rather than in favor of it ; if 
it does not, it is not in that respect different from 
Spiritualism. 



74 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY ? 

4. You say the gospel gives us the true phenomena. 
Please show me any phenomena of a spiritual charac- 
ter in the gospel of to-day. The fact is, you have 
no spiritual phenomena in the churches. In the 
Bible no one pretends to have phenomena — only 
its history. 

5. The gospel does not give an equality in a social 
organization. Its language is, " Let your women 
keep silence in the churches." " I permit not a 
woman to speak, or to usurp authority." " Let as many 
servants as are under the yoke count their masters 
worthy of all honor." This is not social equality. 

6. Its " ideal man " was not perfect. He got mad at 
the Jews because they could not answer a question. 
Mark iii. 5. Destroyed a herd of swine. Matt. viii. 32. 
Cursed a fig tree because it did not bear figs out of 
season. Matt. xxi. 19. Drove the Jews out of their 
own meeting-house. Matt. xxi. 12. Even his first 
miracle was to make wine to treat a crowd that was 
already drunk. John ii. 1-10. 

7. The "rule of life" laid down in the Bible is 
contradictory, sometimes threatening with death those 
who are not circumcised, or do not keep the Sabbath, 
at other times urging that " circumcision is nothing, 
and uncircumcision is nothing," and that no man 
should judge you with reference to Sabbaths. 

8. If any good could grow out of the Bible's pro- 
posed judgment day, it puts it so many quintillions 
of years in the future that it loses its effect. It waits 
for judgment until " the last day." That is a great 
way ahead. You have heard of the thief who stole 
the half of a hog, and was told by the owner that he 
should pay the penalty at the day of judgment. The 



75 

thief responded, " If you will wait until that time, 
I will steal the other half." 

9. Your ninth proposition is only a continuation of 
the eighth. 

10. Show me where the gospel prohibits a man 
from marrying his sister, having a dozen wives, or 
owning slaves — will you ? 

11. True, the gospel expresses a sympathy for men, 
but not for every man ; it even forbids prayer for cer- 
tain ones, and urges that some are doomed to remain 
filthy. 

12. Your twelfth I have before answered. 

13. In presenting "individual interest to every 
one," the gospel is not peculiar. Every institution 
in the world does that. All appeal to man's selfish- 
ness. 

14. Its " numerous documents," contradicting each 
other as they do, are very much against it. Its " va- 
riety of languages " never can be comprehended. 

15. From your fifteenth one would think that a man 
could not have been " bound to nature " before he 
had heard the gospel. Men are bound to nature even 
in China, and if no gospel had ever been written, could 
not get away from nature. 

16. Please give some proof of your sixteenth prop- 
osition. The gospel always appeals to man's selfish 
interest. Even its Jesus died, not for man's interest, 
but " for the joy that was set before him." Heb. 
xii. 2. 

17. The gospel may give a " basis for faith; " Spirit- 
ualism supplies the place of faith with knowledge. 

18. You think it gives a better object of worship. 
Is it your " dung God " ? I can not argue that ques- 
tion. 



76 SPIRITUALISM OK CHRISTIANITY? 

19. The gospel gives us memorials. We would be 
in a nice ^.x if it was giving us memorials of things 
which never happened. My brother, your memorials 
are to-day leading the church to a system of unpar- 
donable idolatry. Throw them away, and take prin- 
ciples, duties, in their place. 

20. Probably the gospel has stood the test of nine- 
teen hundred years. Sin has stood the test of that many 
thousand ; but I can not reverence it for its age. You 
maj'. Please tell me in your next what the gospel has 
done during its long existence. Has it, or has it not, 
abolished sin ? 

XI. Next you take up my list of reasons for believ- 
ing the Old and New Testaments, not in the first sense 
of the word, elevating ; on this you have done a good 
job. I wish I had the space to reply to you. As I have 
not, I will only correct your most glaring mistakes. 

In the references I gave, which speak disparagingly 
of good works, you say, " In Eph. ii. 8, 9, Paul says 
not a word about good works." I answer, Paul was 
preaching, salvation by grace. His words are, " Not 
of tvorJcs, lest any man should boast" True, he speaks 
about being " created unto good works: " but what 
are they? Nothing but the forms, ceremonies, and 
church ordinances by which they are " built upon the 
foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ 
himself being the chief corner-stone." Your mistake 
with regard to my second proposition, as well as some 
others, grew out of your getting the wrong text. I 
wish I had the space to quote all my scriptures in full. 
You are right ; the Bible does teach that sin is the 
foundation of all misery. It also teaches that it is the 
foundation of salvation, for, "Where sin abounded, 



hull's fourth letter. 77 

grace did much more abound." The fact that they 
were sinners gave a chance for the exercise of " gos- 
pel grace," which made the gospel so lovely, and 
caused Paul to thank God that the Romans had been 
sinners. Rom. vi. 17. Did you know that the logic 
by which you try to use up the "Whatever is, is 
right" doctrine of Pope, could be applied to your 
own Bible ? Let me treat you to a syllogism of your 
own kind. 

1. All that God made is very good. Proof, Gen. 
i. 31. 

2. God made evil. Proof, Isa. xlv. 5-7 ; Amos hi. 6. 

3. Therefore evil is good. 

The difference between my syllogism and yours is, I 
present the proof of mine, and you do not of yours ; 
indeed the sill?/ part of yours is easily seen ; the re- 
mainder is not so apparent. 

" Spiritualism teaches that sin is essential to devel- 
opment : " that is true. The military strength of the 
North was developed by the sins of the nation. The 
sin of slavery developed the sentiments of freedom. 
The sins of the churches and the ministers have de- 
veloped a holy warfare upon them, which will result 
in their extermination. In that sense it is essential to 
development. 

You say that " Spiritualists teach that drunkards, 
liars, prostitutes, &c, occupy higher spheres in the 
spirit-world than do those who have not been disci- 
plined by crime." My brother, have you not got the 
wrong book ? It was your " blessed Jesus," who said 
to the virtuous church members of his day, " Publi- 
cans and harlots go into the kingdom of God before 
you." Matt. xxi. 31. 



78 SPIRITUALISM OB CHRISTIANITY ? 

Don't get things mixed. The passage of Scripture 
that you find fault with me for quoting, states that 
"the blood of Christ cleanses from all sin." My 
point was, that if the blood of Christ cleanses from 
sin, then we are not cleansed by any effort of our 
own — that if we can be cleansed from sin at all, it is 
an excuse for indulging in sin. We often handle 
filthy things we would not handle if we did not know 
that it would wash off. You make another mistake 
in my quotations. You refer to 1 Cor. xi. 1-4, for 
1 Cor. ii. 14. " That alters the case." 

You speak again about the " grand philosophy 
taught by Jesus." Will you obey it ? Will you 
preach for a church who would obey it ? Go without 
purse or scrip ! Take no thought for to-morrow ! 
Give up your earthly possessions, forsake houses, 
lands, and all other things that Gentiles seek after, 
for his sake ! If an enemy strike you, turn the other 
cheek ! I fear you would use the language of another 
Christian — "This Jesus, doctrine is played out." 
Give up your wife and children as he commanded ; 
follow his example of celibacy. You know that while 
"publicans and harlots go into the kingdom of God," 
those who marry are not worthy to obtain that world, 
or at least, it is the unmarried, or those who neither 
marry nor are given in marriage, that are accounted 
worthy to obtain that world. Come, brother, stop 
this eulogizing Jesus' philosophy, and commence 
obeying. 

You make a mistake in your quotation of Matt. x. 
34. You quote verse 37. Verses 34, 35, say, " Think 
not I am come to send peace on earth ; I come not to 
send peace, but a sword. For I am come to set a man 



hull's fourth lettee. 79 

at variance against his father, and the daughter 
against the mother, and the daughter-in-law against 
the mother-in-law." I am astonished that you should 
so frequently get the wrong quotation. 

I know the Bible enjoins upon men to love their 
wives in the same sense it would a slaveholder to 
love his slaves, or a man to love his horse ; that is, 
take good care of them, give them enough to eat, all 
for purely selfish motives. "No man ever yet hated his 
own flesh.^ It is not to a man's interest, pecuniarily, 
to abuse his wife. You quote from Frances Barry and 
Mrs. Corban, to get the Spiritualists' views of mar- 
riage. I am personally acquainted with both parties, 
and never mistrusted that either of them was a Spir- 
itualist. You can beat me finding Spiritualists. 

XII. My space is occupied. In my next I prom- 
ise you a dissertation on biblical and spiritual mar- 
riage. I discover that you are not disposed to deny 
the spiritual phenomena. I am glad of that ; it saves 
me a deal of hard labor. This will allow more space 
to be devoted to its nature and tendency. 

Hoping that the same spirit of candor may obtain 
in all our correspondence, and that the public may take 
as much interest in reading as I do in writing, 
I remain, as ever, your brother, 

Moses Hull. 



. 80 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY? 



W. F. PARKER'S FOURTH REPLY. 

" Cedar Hill," near La Grange, Ky., ) 
July 19, 1872. ) 

Brother Hull : In response to yours of July 13, 
I submit the following : — 

I. As to errors of your copyist. 

1. I am forced to read and reply to your letters as 
I receive them. I regret the occurrence of such 
things, as I dislike to waste time or labor. But really 
I sometimes think that your errors regarding the Bible 
are so palpable, bold, and self-confuting, that I waste 
paper, ink, and time in opening them out for public 
inspection. In fact, I sometimes think that you do 
not, that you can not, believe your own representa- 
tions of the Bible. Still, in spite of this unfavorable 
impression, I will consider you sincere, and seek, by a 
kindly style and sound reason, to correct your untrue 
conclusions. 

2. In casting my eye upon the proof texts you in- 
tended to submit to me, I can not see that they are 
any more favorable to your proposition than the texts 
which your " copyist " substituted. Both fail entirely 
to be of any service to you. 

II. I will now present, in fair detail, your proof 
texts. 

1st. You desire me to believe that the Bible " loves 
sin; in fact, makes sin the foundation of all happiness," 



packer's fotjbth letter. 81 

To prove the truth of this, you say you really quoted 
Rom. vi. 17, not Rom. v. 17. You unequivocally 
concede that your doctrine is not in Rom. v. 17. I 
can not see how you can see any of it in Rom. vi. 17. 
"But God be thanked that you were the servants 
of sin ; but ye have obeyed from the heart that form 
of doctrine which was delivered you." 

1. This passage does not say a word about loving sin. 

2. It does not intimate that " sin " is " the founda- 
tion " of anything — not even of happiness. 

3. Had you not first desired to find such a doctrine 
in the Bible, you would never have dreamed of quot- 
ing this passage. 

4. You try to find the doctrine in the fact that 
Paul "thanked " God that the Roman Christians had 
been at one time of their lives "the servants (slaves) 
of sin." 

1. Admitting, for the sake of argument only, that 
Paul did thank God because the Romans had been 
sinners (which is not true), did he say anything about 
the "foundation of happiness" in connection with 
their sins ? No. Truly, no. 

2. Paul really teaches that " sin " is the ground or 
reason of pain, penalty, or punishment — misery ; not 
of happiness. Hear him. 

To the Romans : 1st. " But unto them that are con- 
tentious, and do not obey the truth (i. e., do right), but 
obey unrighteousness (i. e., do wrong, sin), indigna- 
tion and wrath, tribulation and anguish, upon every 
soul of man that doeth evil." Rom. ii. 8, 9. 

2d. Paul says men slandered him in his day by say- 
ing of him what you say. "As we be slanderously 
reported, and as some affirm we say, Let us do evil 
6 



82 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY ? 

(sin) that good may come, whose damnation is 
just." Rom. iii. 8. 

This one passage for ever brands your proposition, 
so far, at least, as Paul is concerned, with falsity. . 

3d. Again, " Shall we continue in sin, that grace 
may abound ? God forbid." Rom. vi. 1, 2. Which 
he could not have said had he believed sin to be " the 
foundation of happiness." 

4th. Again, " The wages of sin is death " (Rom. 
vi. 23), not happiness, as you affirm. 

More evidence to show your statement false need 
not be given. 

5th. What does your text really mean ? If you 
would read it as candidly as you do even a news- 
paper paragraph, you could not fail to see that Paul 
thanked God, not for the fact of the Romans having 
been wicked once, but that they had been saved from 
that wickedness by obedience. Really and clearly he 
thanked God for their obedience to the gospel. On 
consulting the " Life and Epistles of St. Paul," by 
Conybeare and Howson, I find my idea proven correct 
by their better translation of the passage : "But 
God be thanked that you, who were once the slaves 
of sin, obeyed from your hearts the teaching whereby 
you were molded anew." See the work alluded to, 
p. 558. 

Is there anything in such language to justify your 
charge against the Bible ? Not a word. 

As you profess to love the truth and reason, I think 
you should never again quote Rom. vi. 17 to prove 
that the Bible loves sin, and makes it the foundation 
of happiness. 

III. Your second text. You say, " I quoted Jer. 
xlviii. 10, to prove that the Bible leads to war." 



83 

Well, your copyist gave me Jer. xviii. 10, and so 
far as your proposition goes, it may just as well re- 
main Jer. xviii. 10. 

Still, I will give Jer. xlviii. 10 proper attention, and 
remark, — 

1. That, though that passage has been in the book 
so long, you can not, nor can any man, show that any 
man or any nation ever dreamed of quarreling or 
going to war on the strength of that passage. 

2. Wicked men may have quoted it, like yourself, 
for a wicked purpose ; but they never did so because 
they believed it taught them or anybody else to make 
war. 

3. It is an element of Jeremiah's remarkable 
prophecy against Moab. He foresees the time when 
the consequences of Moab's bad religion and bad poli- 
tics would develop a terrible fruitage of crime, blood, 
war, and devastation. Under the afflatus of the pro- 
phetic impulse he cries, " Give wings unto Moab, that 
it may flee and get away ; for the cities thereof shall 
be desolate, without any to dwell therein. Cursed be 
he that doeth the work of the Lord deceitfully, and 
cursed be he that keepeth back his sword from 
blood." 

4. The Assyrians were the destroyers whom the 
prophet foresaw and of whom he spoke. And cer- 
tainly you will not presume to say the Assyrians 
destroyed Moab or any other country because Jer- 
emiah said, "Cursed be he that keepeth back his 
sword from blood." 

5. I am, and have been, a life-long believer in 
the entire Bible. I believe it to be truth, without 
admixture of error. And I assure you that I see 



84 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY? 

nothing in the passage which would justify me in 
making war on anything. And if an uncompromis- 
ing Bible believer like me can see nothing in the pas- 
sage teaching me the duty of blood shedding, I think 
it is because no such thing is inculcated in the words. 

IV. Your third text. You say, " I quoted Col. 
ii. 8, to prove that the Bible was opposed to philos- 
ophy." 

" Beware lest any one spoil you through philosophy 
and vain deceit, after the tradition of men, and not 
after Christ." 

To which I submit, — 

1. You know that Paul speaks here not of all 
philosophies, but of that thing which was called " phi- 
losophy ' ' in his day. 

2. If you could prove that Paul meant by that 
term just what you mean by it, then the text would 
have some connection with your proposition. What 
you mean by " philosophy " is " knowledge, learning." 
Paul did not mean that. 

3. You know that there are many philosophies ; as, 
1. Natural philosophy; 2. Philosophy of Language; 
3. Mental philosophy; 4. Platonic philosophy; 5. 
Epicurean philosophy ; 6. Aristotelian philosophy ; 
7. Harmonial philosophy ; 8. Philosophy of Religion, 
&c, &c, &c. 

4. You know that some of these philosophies are 
worthless for all good purposes. 

5. You know that there is such a thing, and ever 
has been, as false philosophy, which does more evil 
than good to its devotees. 

6. It was this false philosophy of his time that 
Paul discouraged and opposed. 



paeker's fourth letter. 85 

7. For the same reasons which moved him to con- 
demn it, the enlightened mind of this age has repudi- 
ated it, so that one now teaching the materialism of 
Epicurus, or the vaporings of the Gnostics, would be 
considered quite non compos mentis. 

So it seems to me that these three correct quota- 
tions make you appear just as " ridiculous " as did the 
"three innocent errors." 

I hope you will keep your promise that you " will 
try to avoid such mistakes in future. " 

By all means do so — both mistakes in texts, and 
especially the sense of texts. 

V. 1. I am glad you so candidly confess that 
Spiritualism can not give us better " writers," or writ- 
ings, to make better, happier, or more prosperous 
men; or facts, or moral principles, or spiritual phe- 
nomena, than are furnished us by the Bible, which I 
conceive to be a total surrender of the question. 

2. Your "present truth" has no meaning, to my 
mind, apart from all past truth. 

3. "Should our inspiration of to-day, &c, . . . 
it is better for us, because it is ours." 

1. " Our inspiration." My friend, do you have 
any regard for language ? Please, then, say no more 
about " our inspiration." To a man of sober sense, 
such abuse of language and reason is lamentable 
indeed. 

2. Suppose I grant you an "inspiration;" your 
principle that it is best for you because it is yours, is 
absurd. Carry out your principle, and a pretty world 
this will be in one century. The squalid Egyptian 
would be content still with his rags and filth because 
they are his, rather than clothe himself in the ancient 



86 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY? 

garments of the Pharaohs, because they were made 
in an ancient day. O, no ; your principle will stop all 
growth in arts, sciences, and literature. The past is 
full of glorious things, many of which modern art 
has been trying, yet in vain, to reproduce. 

But the past inspiration is ours — is ours embodied 
in imperishable, expressed thought; and it will live 
forever. Your " inspiration " will die with you ; yea, 
often dies before your mediums die. Your inspira- 
tion is a delusion. You claim it, but have no signs 
of it. I think your letters clearly demonstrate that 
inspiration, with you, is a minus quantity. 

3. Your defense of spiritualistic writers, on the 
plea that they " can be no worse than the bloodthirsty 
robber who is said to have written the first five books 
of the Bible," &c, is unfortunate for your cause. 

Does the blackness of biblical characters take the 
stain out of spiritualistic characters ? 

In your repeated flings at the names of the men 
who are more universally reverenced than any others 
of history, is a signal betrayal of the unmerciful, un- 
truthful, malignant, and persecuting spirit of Spirit- 
ualism. What you do to those men who are dead, 
because they gave to us the Bible history and its 
honors, which are the inveterate adversaries of your 
vain philosophy, you would do to all living oppo- 
nents if you had the power, and dared do so. This 
you may deny ; but the persistent calumny heaped 
upon sacred characters by you and your colleagues 
indicates the activity of an awful principle, which 
needs only favorable conditions to stab, hang, and 
burn ; for the man who will maliciously and know- 
ingly kill one's reputation will, if need be, kill one's 



87 

body and soul, if possible to be safely done. Such is 
the spirit which is betrayed by modern infidelity in 
its treatment of Bible men. I trust you are a better 
man than your faith justifies one to expect ; indeed, I 
know you are. 

I must notice some of your attacks upon the his- 
torical characters of the Bible. 

1. Moses. He was not a bloodthirsty man. 

He killed an Egyptian in defense of one of his 
fellow Hebrews. This you love to call a murder. 
It was not murder. It was done in heat of blood. 
It was manslaughter, and, I dare say, wholly uninten- 
tional. And had he not killed the Egyptian, but 
attacked him, as a Hebrew he would have been in- 
famous. Knowing this fact before he made the 
attack, he discreetly looked around to see if any one 
was seeing the matter. No witnesses being in view, 
he attacked the Egyptian, slew him, and then hid his 
body in the sand. Thus was the crime completed ; 
and he fled for fear. I have no disposition to deny, 
nor to get rid of these facts. I regret his folly ; but 
he was punished for it by a banishment of forty 
years. I regret the existence of the record, because 
the enemies of the Bible so abuse it. Yet I am 
thankful for the record, because it clearly proves the 
impartiality and honesty of the document. The 
good is told ; the bad is not suppressed. 

Moses, viewed from the stand-point of his own 
times, in connection with the circumstances surround- 
ing him, and judged by the moral standard according 
to which his conscience was developed and molded, 
will at once be pronounced as great for his goodness 
as he was great for his courage and sagacity. And 



88 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY ? 

the same rule being applied to the characters you 
allude to will fully vindicate them. 

2. Solomon. His wickedness and folly are ad- 
mitted. But they teach the best lesson the world 
ever had on the vanity of sensual pleasures and pur- 
suits. He does not tell us to do as he did, but 
makes his experience the warning and lesson of all 
persons of all ages. 

3. David. He, too, erred; sometimes woefully. 
Yet his life is full of resplendent nobility, and, like 
others, he saw a time when repentance for past errors 
made him well calculated to become a teacher of all 
good things. Judge him with a just judgment — 
Christians ask no more. 

4. Paul. This noble hero's life is so well known 
as to need no defense. Up to the time of Iris perse- 
cution of disciples, his life was blameless. But he 
became a persecutor, thinking he was then doing 
right. When convinced of his error, he stopped ; 
and he heaped blessings upon what he had before 
injured. 

As to his becoming all things to all men, there was 
nothing wrong in that. Your inspired Confucius 
says of the " superior man," " In a position of wealth 
and honor, he does what is proper to a position of 
wealth and honor. In a poor and low position, he 
does what is proper to a poor and low position. Sit- 
uated among barbarous tribes, he does what is proper 
to a situation among barbarous tribes. In a position 
of sorrow and difficulty, he does what is proper in a 
position of sorrow and difficulty. The superior man 
can find himself in no position in which he is not 
himself." — Chap, from Bib. of the Ages, p. 60. 



parker's fourth letter. 89 

In this sense, Paul was all things to all men, — in 
no other. Paul is right, and Moses Hull is wrong. 

His misunderstanding with Barnabas was no crime 
or fault. 

The other things alleged against Paul need no re- 
mark ; they have only to be seen in the Scripture to 
convict you of doing violence to the record, — as 
usual. 

You claim Buddha as being one of your inspired 
ones. In connection with your attacks upon the 
good men of the Bible, you should remember one or 
two of his oracles. 

He says, "A wicked man who reproaches a vir- 
tuous one is like a man who looks up and spits at 
Heaven ; the spittle soils not Heaven, but comes bach 
and defiles his own person" 

Again, " He is like one who flings dirt at another 
against the wind ; the dirt does but return on him 
who threw it. The virtuous man can not be hurt. 
The misery that the other would inflict comes 
back on himself." — Chap, from the Bib. of the Ages, 
p. 36. 

5. You do admit, then, that Jesus did have a doc- 
trine? Thank you. But why spoil the appearance 
of candor here, by affirming that his doctrine " was 
pure, unadulterated Egyptianism," and that " his 
surroundings, when his father took him down into 
Egypt, were calculated to develop the very senti- 
ments he uttered, as well as to lead to the mode of 
life he lived"? 

Jesus went down into Egypt under two years of 
age, and remained there not more than one year, at 
furthest. How his surroundings could develop so 



90 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY ? 

much in so young a child and in so short a time, no 
one but a progressive Spiritualist can see. 

6. Your comments on the Sermon on the Mount 
are as desperate as all else I find in your logic. 

1. Jesus does not require the abandonment of pub- 
lic prayer. He only discourages its prostitution to 
base ends.' He forbids praying, " standing in the syn- 
agogues or corners of the streets," to be seen of men. 
Really the privacy of the closet is the place to pray. 
Private prayer belongs to the closet. An ostentatious 
parade of devotion in public is, and always has been, 
disgusting. 

2. In Matt. vi. 24-34, Jesus only dissuades from 
covetousness — an over-anxiety for material comforts. 
He would have men first holy, then attentive to other 
duties. It is a sweet assurance that God so cares for 
us, that he will not let ns perish from want, if we be 
pure, holy, and faithful to life's duties. 

He urges us (verse 33) to seek " his righteousness," 
i. e., perfect life, and "all" needed "things shall be 
added " to us, as a consequence of our correct life. 

3. As to giving the cloak to the one who by law 
takes the coat, it is only correcting evil by doing 
good. The principle is a sound one. Even Buddha, 
one of your "inspired " men, inculcated this natural 
principle in these words : — 

" Let a man overcome anger with love, let him 
overcome evil with good, let him overcome the greedy 
by liberality, the liar by truth." 

Certainly you should not condemn Jesus and praise 
Buddha. 

Act on the injunction of Jesus, and you will soon 
learn that his suggestion is not folly. 



packer's fourth letter. 91 

VI. No, I do not see how the true life of one Spirit- 
ualist can be the false life of another. Your comments 
give me no light. One Spiritualist teaches that the 
true life consists in chastening our appetites, control- 
ling and correcting them ; another says the true life 
consists in yielding to the appetites. One Spiritual- 
ist saj^s the true life consists in living in obedience to 
the " angels " — ghosts. Another says it consists in 
controlling and developing the " spirits." I know no 
two spiritualistic writers who are able to agree or have 
agreed as to what the true life is. I am not able to 
find a true life in Spiritualism anywhere. But the 
gospel gives us the exemplification of a true life in 
Jesus. In this fact we see the extreme superiority of 
the gospel over " Harmonialism." 

VII. I see no evidence in anything you present for 
believing that a solitary prediction of the prophets 
has ever failed. 

1. Jonah. " Yet forty days and Nineveh shall be 
overthrown." 

It was not destroyed in forty days ; ergo, Jonah 
failed. 

No. He preached to the Ninevites in order to lead 
them to reformation. The subversion of the city was 
to be the result of impenitency. But they repented; 
ergo, the city was not destroyed. 

2. In your remarks on the promise made to Abra- 
ham you seem to lose sight of the difference in the 
meanings of the Bible words " possession" and "in- 
heritance." While the " ownership " or " posses- 
sion" of the land was in Abraham, yet during his life 
he did not have the sovereignty over a rood of it. 
His seed possessed, by descent from him, the land, 



92 SPIEITTJALISM OH CHRISTIANITY? 

and they enjoyed it until they were cast out of the 
enjoyment, to hold the land only as a granted posses- 
sion. Every Jew living feels that a portion of Pal- 
estine is his, that the Gentile is a trespasser, and that 
ere long he will be put into the enjoyment of his 
" possession." 

There is no conflict between Joshua and Stephen 
— the " possession " will last forever. The claims of 
every Jew to-day is a literal fulfillment of 'prophecy 
made three thousand six hundred years ago. 

VIII. You seek to kill the influence of Mrs. Emma 
Hardinge by making her out a Christian, not a Spir- 
itualist. I do not wonder. Her statement was fatal 
to your impeachment of the Bible ; otherwise she had 
been " a distinguished Spiritualist." 

IX. Read Walter Scott's " Demonstration of the 
Authority of the Bible," and impeach it if you can. 

I am not controverting with you the evidences of 
Christianity. The world needs no more argument 
for that until infidels fairly respond to those already 
in print. 

X. As to that " dung God," I see you are wounded. 
You flutter — you grow sick. I do not censure you. 
You only shrink from the horrors of your favorite 
Pantheism — your God of matter. 

XL You touch lightly and with uncertain pen my 
twenty reasons for believing Christianity better for 
man than Spiritualism. 

Those reasons I hastily noted down, not as our best 
reasons, but as a few of our good reasons. 

If my good reasons give you so much trouble, I 
know not what you could have said if I had enumer- 
ated our best reasons. 



Parker's fourth letter. 93 

1. 1. Spiritualism does not put man under the au- 
thority of God, nor anything else. 

2. Christianity does put man under the authority 
of God. 

3. It does not put man under a man-made Bible, 
but under the authority revealed in that Bible and in 
Nature. 

II. Spiritualism, as taught by all the documents I 
have read, has no God; hence, can know no such 
relation with him as sons. You feel the importance 
of this social relationship in the work of human eleva- 
tion ; hence you would claim it for Spiritualism, that 
ridicules the idea of a God that can be socially related 
to man. 

III. The gospel teaches pardon, not to take away 
all the consequences of sin, but to overcome evil with 
good. Spiritualism, you say, knows no such princi- 
ple. I know it. Hence it is a bloody Shylock, claim- 
ing his pound of flesh ; — no mercy, no forgiveness in 
the code of Spiritualism. Draco had a clean spirit in 
comparison with it. 

IV. I am not talking about "the churches of to- 
day." I said Christianity — the documents of Chris- 
tianity — " gives us all the true phenomena (of which 
those of modern Spiritualism are base imitations only), 
better certified and more consonant with reason and 
necessity." This fact you can not controvert. Your 
play on "history " is empty. 

V. You seem disposed to deny that " Christianity 
gives a social organization in which all are equal, and 
bound by the same ties, are under equal obligations 
to work for each other's good." 

I do not wonder that you should seek to prove this 



94 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY? 

truth an error. But failure will overwhelm you here, 
as it does everywhere in your war upon the Bible. 

1st. Your first reason for denying my fifth ground of 
preference for Christianity is based upon these words : 
"Let your women keep silence in the churches." 

1. Because silence is demanded of women, there is 
no evidence that they are not socially equal with men 
in the Christian organization. 

2. Your spirit-inspired Menu, by whom you had 
rather be governed than by Paul, has laid down the 
oracle that " A woman is never fit for independence." 
— Chap, from the Bib. of the Ages, p. 28. 

3. A correct reading of the New Testament will 
show that women were allowed to talk, and pray, and 
sing, and eat, in the Christian assemblies, with the same 
freedom of the men, but they were under the same 
restrictions also. 

2d. Your second reason reads, " I permit not a 
woman to speak or usurp authority." 

Why did 3^011 not quote the rest of the sentence — 
" over the man" ? 

The idea with Paul is this : " If one of two persons, 
a man and a woman, is to speak, which shall have the 
preference ? The man. In disputed cases like this, 
there must be some rule. Either the man or woman 
must yield. And Paul, in deciding this nice point in 
favor of man, I do not think denies the social equali- 
ty of woman ; but I think the social equality of wo- 
man is thereby plainly manifest. 

3d. Your third reason reads, "Let as many ser- 
vants as are under the yoke count their masters 
worthy of all honor." 

1. The Christian Scriptures — even Paul — teach 



paeker's fourth letter. 95 

that " in Christ " there is " neither male nor female, 
bond nor free, Jew nor Greek, barbarian nor Scythi- 
an ; but all are one, and every one members one of 
another." 

2. When Paul sent the slave Onesimus back to his 
master Philemon, he thus wrote : " I beseech thee for 
my son Onesimus, whom I have begotten in my bonds, 
who in time past was to thee unprofitable, but now 
profitable to thee and to me ; whom I have sent 
again : thou therefore receive him, that is, mine own 
bowels. . . . For perhaps he, therefore, departed 
for a season, that thou shouldst receive him for ever, 
not now as a servant, but above a servant, a brother 

BELOVED." 

3. In the Masonic fraternity, master and servant 
can and do stand on the same level, without destruc- 
tion of the relation of master and servant. So also 
is this done in the Christian fraternity ; in the church, 
both stand on the same foundation, and both have the 
same master. 

Enough. 

VI. You try to get rid of my ideal man. 

1. You should show that Spiritualism has some- 
thing better than an ideal man to offer to men, as 
a rule for the development of a true character and 
life. 

2. You try to get rid of Jesus as the ideal man, by 
trying to show that he was an imperfect man. I can 
not see how the passages you quote show any such 
thing. 

A. " He got mad." — Mark iii. 5. 

1. Mark does not say " He got mad." 

2. He does say, " And when he looked round about 
on them with anger" 



96 SPIRITUALISM OE CHRISTIANITY? 

(a) Is " anger " necessarily an evil thing? 

(b) Can not one be angry and sin not ? 

(c) Was not the anger of Jesus, then, sinless ? 

I think so, because Mark said, " he looked round 
about on them with anger, being grieved for the hard- 
ness of their heart." 

1. Grief does not cause a sinful anger. 

2. Jesus' anger ended in the healing of a palsied 
hand. Sinful anger never ends in the simple accom- 
plishment of good only. 

The anger entertained by Jesus at this time was of 
a kind that the more there is of it in the world, 
the better for the world. 

B. " He destroyed a herd of swine." — Matt. viii. 32. 
You are in error. He only suffered the " spirits of 

dead men " to make spiritualistic mediums of the 
hogs, when the mediums committed suicide. 

Why do you fight pork eating, whilst the " spirits " 
seem to be so partial towards swine ? 

C. " He cursed a fig tree." — Matt. xxi. 19. 

1. He simply said that the tree should never bear 
fruit ; in consequence of which the tree died. Is it 
any more harmful to destroy a tree by a word than 
by an ax ? 

2. The very record you quote commends my ideal 
man as worthy of love and unbounded reverence. 

D. " He drove the Jews out of their own meeting- 
house." — Matt. xxi. 12. 

1. Perhaps they deserved it. - Then he only did his 
duty. 

2. The Jews, in their quietly submitting to the 
offense, confessed that he did right. 

E. He made wine for " a crowd that was already 
drunk."— -John ii. 1-10. 



PAEKEU'S FOURTH LETTER. 97 

1. You admit the wine-making from water. 

2. There is not a fact in the record to show that a 
soul at the feast was " drunk." 

3. You will have to search more diligently for blem- 
ishes in the character of my ideal man, before you can 
persuade me that Spiritualism has anything better to 
offer the world. 

VII. I submit this item "to the jury." 

VIII. Is also submitted. 

IX. Also. 

X. Also. 

XI. Also. 

XII. Also. 

XIII. There is some difference between an " object 
of individual interest " and " selfishness." When you 
attempt an answer to my 13th reason, I will reply. 

XIV. Submitted. 

XV. Also. 

XVI. You say, give some proof of your 16th propo- 
sition. I will. 

1st. Jesus says, " If any man will come after me, 
let him deny himself" &c. — Matt. xvi. 24; Luke 
ix. 23. 

1. Paul says, " Mortify, therefore, your members 
which are upon the earth; fornication, uncleanness, 
inordinate affection, evil concupiscence, and covetous- 
ness, which is idolatry." — Col. iii. 5. 

2. " And they that are Christ's have crucified the 
flesh with its affections and lusts." — Gal. v. 24. 

3. " Teaching us that denying ungodliness and 
worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and 
godly in this present world. 

2d. The incentives are, — 
7 



98 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY ? 

1. Personal purity and happiness. 

2. The good of others. 

3. The honor of the gospel. 

4. The glory of Christ. 

5. The glory of God. 

6. The inheritance of temporal good. 

7. The response of a "good conscience." 

8. Assurance in trial. 

9. Triumph over the fear of death. 

10. A resurrection from the dead. 

11. A heavenly body. 

12. An everlasting home with God. 

Has Spiritualism incentives to self-discipline supe- 
rior to these ? If so, show them. 

XVII. Submitted. 

XVIII. Also. 

XIX. Also. 

XX. Also. 

In concluding this part of my letter, allow me to 
say, that your reply to my twenty reasons is very 
much like a confession of total defeat on your part. 
You have not displayed your usual courage and 
strength. You seem to wither when you approach 
them ; but I can not blame you. 

1. Accept my thanks for your honest acknowledg- 
ment that I did a " good job " in my animadversions 
on your twenty reasons for Spiritualism. I wish I 
could return the compliment, but candidly I can not. 

2. As my letter is already so long, I shall not no- 
tice the " mistakes " which your " copyist " has com- 
pelled rne again to make. 

3. Your syllogism. 

I admit that " all that God made is very good." 



Parker's fourth letter. 99 

I deny that " God made " all "evil." 
Hence your conclusion may or may not be true ; 
as, " therefore," some " evil is good." 
Your proof texts. 

1. Isa. xlv. 5-7. 

" I . . . create evil ; " not all evil. 

2. Amos iii. 6. 

1. This passage seems clearly to favor your position* 

2. "Evil," in your sense, means " sin," as well as 
pain ; for that reason I deny your minor. 

3. If you mean by " evil," physical calamities or 
affections only, I will even grant your minor, and then 
show that your conclusion that evil is good is true ; 
for every pain felt is an evil, and, if properly inter- 
preted, must develop good. 

I will close this letter by hurriedly noticing a 
few points with which you conclude yours of the 
13th inst. 

1. " The sin of slavery developed the sentiment of 
freedom." 

No. An abuse of "freedom," rather, developed the 
sentiment of slavery. 

2. War was made upon the churches before their 
" sins " outraged anybody. 

3. You think the Bible teaches " that drunkards, 
&c, occupy higher spheres than do those who have 
not been disciplined by crime." 

Your proof is, "Publicans," i. e., tax-gatherers, 
" and harlots go into the kingdom of God before you." 
— Matt. xxi. 31. 

1. Publicans were not sinners because they were 
publicans. 

2. Their discipline as publicans did not fit them for 
the kingdom. 



100 SPIRITUALISM Oil CHRISTIANITY ? 

3. Publicans forsook their publicanisrn before en- 
tering the kingdom. 

4. In the kingdom they mourned the fact that they 
ever had been sinful publicans. 

So with the harlots. 

1. They forsook that life. 

2. They deplored that life. 

3. They entered the kingdom to avoid that life and 
its fruits, not to enjoy them. 

4. No Bible writer ever intimates that one of these 
characters occupies a "higher sphere" in the king- 
dom in consequence of their former sins. 

The Bible specially says that no " liar, drunkard, 
adulterer, fornicator, or unclean person,'" shall inherit 
the kingdom of God, which it could not say if those 
sins disciplined any one for that kingdom. 

Defeated again. 

Finally : your fourth letter has been read and duly 
weighed. Still, I have seen not one good reason for 
forsaking the Bible for Spiritualism. You are not 
converting me. I know I shall continue in the 
" darkness of the old superstition," — a stranger to 
the glories of Harmonialism — unless you begin soon 
to display some of the excellences of the system. 

You promised me argument. I have not seen it. 

Can you not give one good argument in support of 
Spiritualism ? 

If so, display it. 

Wishing you health, 

I am, as ever, 

W. F. Parker. 



hull's fifth letter. 101 



MOSES HULL'S FIFTH LETTER. 

Boston, Mass., August 3, 1872. 

Brother Parker : Your fourth letter was re- 
ceived more than a week since, but being just on the 
eve of a camp-meeting where I had to conduct all of 
the business, and do the principal part of the speak- 
ings I have not had time, until this morning, to read 
it. Now I will try to jot down a reply. 

I. I remember my promise to say a few words on the 
biblical and spiritual ideas of the marriage question. 
You seem to be in a terrible fear that Spiritualism will 
overthrow the sacred institution of marriage. Does 
your marriage hang on so slender a thread that Spirit- 
ualism could snap it in twain ? If so, the quicker it 
is sundered, the better. You know that Christianity 
shook off all that could then be shaken of Jewish in- 
stitutions ; and promises, " Yet once more I shake not 
the earth only, but also heaven. And this word, yet 
once more, signifleth the removing of those things 
that are (or may be) shaken, as of things that are 
made, that those things which can not be shaken may 
remain." Heb. xii. 26, 27. Now, if your marriage can 
not be shaken, it will remain. If it can be shaken to 
pieces, it should not remain. Let us have the bonds 
that bind two souls in one so strong and so natural 
that nothing can snap them asunder. Your fear that 
true marriage will suffer from Spiritualism is kin- 



102 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY? 

dred with the fear so often expressed in former times, 
that, "If the niggers are set free, they will all come 
right here among us, and marry our sons and daugh- 
ters." I always answered, "No doubt your sons and 
daughters will find their level ; that is a matter that 
does not depend upon the abolition of slavery. " So, my 
dear brother, I answer you : If love is stronger than 
all things else, it will hold you to your wife. If love 
should prove strong enough to hold you to your wife, 
you will not need the aid of any institution to strength- 
en the bonds. If love is not strong enough, cursed 
be the institution that forces you to live with one for 
whom you have no love. Have no fear ; Spiritualism 
does not design to cut any ropes that lift humanity 
heavenward. It only designs to sever those that bind 
the soul bach from truth, progress, and heaven. 

II. I will not speak for others, but my Spiritualism 
is certainly opposed to the sj^stem of marriage taught 
in many places in the Bible. The old bachelor Paul 
did not believe in marriage at all. He believed there 
were other worse institutions, and would accept mar- 
riage as an alternative — on no other ground. He said, 
" It is good for a man not to touch a woman ; never- 
theless, to avoid fornication, let every man have his 
own wife." 1 Cor. vii. 1, 2. As little as Paul thought 
of the marriage institution, he thought he would pre- 
fer it to going to hell. His words are, " I would that 
all men were even as I myself (that is, unmarried) ; 
but every man hath his proper gift of God, one af- 
ter this manner and another after that. I say, there- 
fore, to the unmarried and widows, It is good for them 
that they abide even as I But if they can not contain, 
let them marry, for it is better to marry than to burn.'" 



hull's fifth letter. 103 

Verses 7-9. Paul thought, to avoid fornication it 
was necessary to marry. I think that what passes for 
marriage is one of the poorest preventives in the 
world. David had a few wives of his own ; then a 
batch of Saul's wives were given to his bosom (see 
2 Sam. xii. 8) ; but they were not all enough to pre- 
vent fornication. See ii. 11, 1-5. The marriage 
system, though Abraham had beautiful Sarah for a 
wife, was not enough to prevent fornication in his 
case, for he left his wife's bed, and went to that of his 
servant girl. But he set an example for many of his 
Christian followers of abandoning his paramour and 
her illegitimate offspring. Gen. xvi. 4, xxi. 14. 

Solomon was married seven hundred times, and had 
three hundred concubines, or paramours, thrown in, 
and yet he was not satisfied. These and other such 
instances of marriage recorded in the Bible are not 
indorsed by the great body of Spiritualists. 

At a convention in Vermont, the Spiritualists 
handed the world a resolution embodying my views 
of marriage. Here it is : — 

"Resolved, That the only true and natural marriage 
is an exclusive conjugal love between one man and 
one woman ; and the only true home is the isolated 
home based upon this true love." 

And you really oppose the Spiritualists' views of 
marriage ! Do you ? or are you only trying to frighten 
your ignorant brethren who may read this discussion ? 
Probably your views of marriage would be better ex- 
pressed in Num. xxxi. 17 : " Now, therefore, kill 
every male among the little ones, and kill every 
woman that hath . . . But all the women 
children that have not . . , keep alive for 

yourselves." 



104 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY? 

That is a system of marriage (or concubinage ; 
which do you call it ?) opposed to modern Spiritual- 
ism. So was that practiced by Rev. Robertson of 
Louisville, while you were writing your last letter to 
me on the evils of Spiritualism. 

You will remember how the tribe of Benjamin got 
their wives. They stole them, trapped them, and 
took them without so much as their own consent — 
lay in ambush and caught them as you would a wild 
animal, or a panther does its prey. If that is biblical 
marriage, I prefer another kind. See Judges xxi. 
7-23. 

Pardon me, dear brother ; I have occupied so much 
space in the fulfillment of my promise, that I must 
pass many of the smaller points of your letter with- 
out notice. That, however, is hardly to be regretted, 
as many of your points are so self-refuting that no 
words of mine could hasten their destruction. All the 
ad eaptandum about "your not believing your own 
arguments," " insincerity," &c, you may consider 
thrown in. I have no space for such remarks, nor to 
reply to such charges in your letter. 

I made no " concession " one way or another with 
regard to Rom. v. 17. I have not attempted its dis- 
cussion in any way. Don't be in too big a hurry for 
concessions and victories ; you may " catch a Tartar." 
Rom. vi. 17, thanks God that the church had been 
" the servants of sin." The texts you quoted about 
" obeying the truth," " obeying unrighteousness," 
&c, referred to church forms and ceremonies. It 
made no difference how good a man was — he did not 
obey the truth, but lived in unrighteousness, if he 
failed to comply with the forms, ceremonies, and ordi- 



hull's fifth letter. 105 

nances preached by Paul. It was simply Jesus' obe- 
dience, and a belief in that, that made people right- 
eous in Paul's estimation. See Rom. v. 3 9. It was 
Abraham's belief, and not his good works, that made 
him righteous. Rom. iv. 3. And the righteousness 
preached by Paul was imputed, not the real right-do- 
ing of the person. See verse 11. The " babes and 
sucklings " of the gospel were sinners as really as 
others ; but they had a blessing that common people 
have not. Their iniquities were covered, and the Lord 
would not impute or account their sins to them. See 
Rom. iv. 7-8. 

Conybeare and Howson saw the difficulty, and tried 
to dodge it in the way you speak of. Alexander 
Campbell invented another and better dodge. Dr. 
Clarke still another. They are all capital illustrations 
of "twisting and turning," nothing more. You are a 
scholar, and know as others can not, that they are 
all only artful dodges. 

III. And so you think I am like other wicked men, 
and quoted Jer. xlviii. 10, " Cursed be he that keep- 
eth back his sword from blood," for a wicked purpose. 
Complimentary — ain't you ? 

I have no reply. When I want to know the mean- 
ing of a passage. of Scripture, I must refer to "an 
uncompromising Bible-believer " like yourself. The 
Bible can certainly have no meaning that you have 
not seen. I like the compliments you bestow on your- 
self better than those you give me. 

IV. You think Paul did not warn against knowl- 
edge or learning, when he admonished his brethren to 
" beware lest any man spoil them through philoso- 
phy." In this you are mistaken ; he was always very 



106 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY? 

careful to warn against " excellency of speech or wis- 
dom," even resolving every question back to the 
power of God, in contrast with " the wisdom of men." 
For himself, he determined to ignore all knowledge, 
save " Jesus Christ and him crucified." 1 Cor. ii. 1-5. 

Your division of philosophy into eight different 
classes does not help the matter. Paul did not specify 
any class of philosophy. In the absence of any spe- 
cifications, I submit that he meant anything that could 
come under the term. 

V. You forget that this is a written discussion, 
and thus render yourself liable to the charge of mis- 
representation, when, if my words were not written, 
you might escape a just visitation for some of your 
sins. 

Here is an illustration. In section III. you say, 
" I am glad you so candidly confess that Spiritualism 
can not give us better writings or writers to make 
better, happier, or more prosperous men, or facts, or 
moral principles, or spiritual phenomena, than are 
furnished by the Bible, which I conceive to be a total 
surrender of the whole question." 

Here it is ! Surrendered again ! You are an adept 
at gaining victories ! This is about the hundredth . 
time you have whipped me out of my boots since these 
letters commenced, and yet I seem to have them on ! 
Now, it is unfortunate for your victory, but the con- 
fession you quote from me I never made, publicly or 
privately, with pen or voice. You should read my 
letters before replying to them. 

The term " present truth " has no meaning to your 
mind. It ought to have. So " uncompromising a 
believer in the Bible ' ' as yourself ought to have read 



hull's fifth lettee. 107 

it enough to have formed the acquaintance of such 
phrases. You will find this, to you meaningless ex- 
pression, in 2 Pet. i. 12. 

You can not see that an inspiration which comes 
to us is ours, and think I murder the English lan- 
guage. I can not be responsible for your obtuseness. 

The " squalid Egyptians," of whom you speak, 
could not, if they would, get " the garments of the 
Pharaohs." The best they could possibly do is to read 
the history of their garments. I incline to think that 
their " filthy rags " would render them more practical 
service in a cold clay than a gilt-edged bound history 
of Pharaoh's old clothes. So I think our inspiration, 
though it may not amount to very much, is better for 
us than the history of that which came to Moses or 
Isaiah. I am a man as really as was Moses of old ; and 
though, for the sake of the argument, I grant that 
Moses' inspiration was perfect, I, by virtue of my 
manhood, demand an inspiration for myself. Your 
prophecies about our inspiration dying with or before 
the mediums, comes by inspiration from a not-very- 
far-seeing class of spirits. 

VI. Your defense of the robber and murderer who 
wrote the first books of the Bible is such as one 
would expect in the first effort of a pettifogger who 
was taking upon himself the role of a lawyer. The 
reader who could not see through the groundwork of 
your pettifogging is not worth an effort to enlighten. 

Brother, had you not better take out a warrant for 
me, and bind me to keep the peace ? You are so 
much afraid that I will "kill your body and soul" ! 
I am dangerous, and if I were not a coward, would 
probably attack you! Don't you get tired of such 



108 SPIRITUALISM OK CHRISTIANITY? 

nonsense ? Can't you see far enough to know that 
all such talk must recoil upon your own head ? Your 
readers are not all fools. They demand argument. 
If you have it, for Heaven's sake bring it along. If 
you have none, show yourself a man, by laying down 
your pen, and yielding the controversy. 

VII. So you defend Paul in becoming " all things 
to all men/' The effort to defend him is laudable, 
the arguments inconsistent. The quotations from 
Confucius, Buddha, and other heathen writers are 
splendid. You will profit by studying these authors. 
None of the quotations are parallel to those I made 
from Paul. There is a vast difference in adapting 
one's self to the circumstances of the poor and the 
rich, and the material circumstances of those by which 
one is surrounded, and becoming lawless when among 
those who are without law. It will do for a minister 
to "weep with those who weep," suffer with those 
who suffer, and adopt the physical, but not the moral, 
condition, of those by whom he is surrounded. 

VIII. Please give your proof that Jesus was in 
Egypt only once, and then only one year. You can 
thus enlighten the world. Even admitting that this 
is true, it does not militate against my position that 
Jesus' doctrine was pure, unadulterated Egyptian- 
ism. 

IX. How do you know that Jonah preached to the 
Ninevites in order to lead to a reformation ? There 
was not a word said about it in his preaching. And 
why was it necessary to preach a lie to reform those 
people who did not know their right hand from their 
left ? Why should Jonah lament the failure of his 
prophecy when they repented, if their repentance was 



hull's fifth letter. 109 

to cause the salvation of the city ? Was Jonah's 
prophecy conditioned on the wickedness of the peo- 
ple ? Is the reformation of the people generally the 
cause of all the failures of prophecy ? Your argument 
on the Abrahamic promise will fall of its own weight. 
I will not kick a dead argument just to convince it of 
after-death punishment. 

X. Did I say Emma Hardinge was not a Spiritu- 
alist ? Did I hint such a thing ? Please read my 
letter again. I never said or thought such a thing. 
I do say she is not a representative of American 
Spiritualism in its differences from Christianity. She 
is a Spiritualist of the English type — one who hitches 
Spiritualism on to Christianity. 

XL Next you seek to shirk the controversy by in- 
viting me again to read Walter Scott's " Great De- 
monstration of the Authority of the Bible" and impeach 
it if I can. I know you would prefer to have me af- 
ter Walter Scott, rather than W. F. Parker. I pre- 
fer at present to follow my own opponent. I presume, 
however, that you have read Walter Scott, and boiled 
his arguments down, and put them into your letters. 
If they were as sickly when used by Walter Scott as 
when put into your articles, "The Great Demonstra- 
tion "is in feeble argumentative health. You must 
call in your doctors of divinity ! That thought that 
" the world needs no more arguments for Christiani- 
ty," is a happy one. If you had thought of it just 
before you undertook to defend it, it would have 
been well for your cause. 

XII. Now that your twenty arguments for Chris- 
tianity have proved worthless, you decide that they 
are not your best arguments. Why did you not hand 



110 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY? 

out your best ? Were you only " funnin' " ? Please 
in your next give us a sample of your very best. I 
think I will yet extort the confession from you that 
all your arguments are worthless. 

XIII. You still stick to your ''ideal man." Well, 
while you only aim as high as Jesus, you will surely 
not ascend beyond him. I want all the good there 
was in Jesus, and more. I do not want it because Je- 
sus or any other person had it, but I want it because 
it is good. Even the mistakes in Jesus' life I want to 
use as illustrations, to save others from the same. 

You think those hogs that Jesus converted, who 
committed suicide, were mediums ; you are mistaken ; 
they were members of your own church; they believed 
in faith, repentance, and baptism for the remission of 
sins, and as soon as they made " the good confession, 1 ' 
that you to this day require of all your converts, viz., 
that Jesus was the Son of God, they went to the sea 
for the purpose of being baptized, and in their eager- 
ness to attend to the ordinance, they got into so steep 
a place that they could not get out. Brother Parker, 
these poor prototypes of yours were the first Christian 
martyrs. I notice many Christians to this day imi- 
tate these ancient hogs in swinishness, if not in other 
particulars. 

XIV. In the record of the wine-making, you think 
" there was not a fact to show that a soul at the feast 
was drunk." Let us see. " The governor of the feast, 
supposing that the bridegroom had furnished the wine, 
called him, and said, Every man at the beginning doth 
set forth good wine ; and when men have well drunk 
(or are well drunk), then that which is worse ; but 
thou hast kept the good wine until now." John ii. 10. 



hull's fifth letter. Ill 

What can that mean but that he had departed from 
the usual custom of giving them the good wine at the 
beginning, and had kept it until they were well drunk? 
If they were not " well drunk," that is, very drunk, 
then there is no meaning in that text. Enough of 
your ideal man. 

XV. The best argument you have made is your re- 
ply to my seventh and fifteenth paragraph inclusive. 
Here it is: "I submit this item to the jury." If you 
had said that at the first of your letter, and then 
written the word " also," after each of my items, your 
case would have stood in a more favorable light. 

XVI. In your incentives to Christianity, many of 
which are very good, you have not given one but 
that is purely selfish ; thus you have proved my words 
true. The most of them I obey. I do it from the 
purely selfish motive of being better and happier. I 
am after happiness, and will do anything that will 
bring it. As nothing wrong will bring lasting happi- 
ness, I will try to refrain from doing wrong. 

Your twelve propositions could be embraced in one 
or two at the furthest. I will embrace the incentives 
Spiritualism offers for purity in one proposition — the 
elevation of humanity. 

XVII. You next admit that all that God made is 
" very good," but you deny that God made all evil. 
That admits that God made some evil. Very well ; 
here is a syllogism : — 

1. All that God made is very good. 

2. God made some evil. 

3. Therefore some evil is good. 

But to your argument. You deny that God made 
all evil ; tell me how it began to exist. 



112 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY ? 

1. Evil or sin, if you please, exists. 

2. Evil either exists by God's power and consent, 
or contrary to God's power and consent. 

3. If it exists by his power, then God is the au- 
thor of sin and evil, and responsible for it. 

4. If it exists contrary to, and in spite of, his power, 
then God would put it down, but can not. 

5. If God can, but will not, put evil down, it is be- 
cause he sees that it is best it should exist, and is, 
therefore, good, or God is malignant. 

6. If God would, but can not, put evil down, then 
evil is king, and God is no longer God. 

My brother, you can not believe that absolute evil 
exists without believing that God is either weak or 
wicked. Which is it ? 

In conclusion, you ask for one good argument in 
support of Spiritualism. I suppose by that you mean 
one argument in favor of the spiritual phenomena. 
You shall have it in my next. 

As ever, your brother, 

Moses Hull. 



W. F. PARKERS FIFTH REPLY. 

Cedar Hill, near La Graxge, Kt., > 
August 15, 1872. 5 

Dear Brother : Your letter, dated August 7, 
came duly to hand, and its contents have been duly 
considered. 

Your remarks on " marriage," which find place in 
the first part of your letter, I will leave unnoticed un- 



paeker's fifth lettee. 113 

til I shall have paid due attention to the other matters 
spread out in your communication. 

I. I must say you have a speedy way of dispos- 
ing of serious difficulties. How easy it is to say. 
11 As many of your points are self-refuting, no words 
of mine could hasten then destruction*' ! I would 
like to have you take the trouble to show some few 
of my ;i self-refuting '• "points.'" And as to my 
charges of insincerity. &c, I will say I am not aware 
that I have hastily made any such charges. I am 
ready to give you the credit of being sincere in the 
most glaring perversions of Scripture record, if you 
avow your "sincerity." But I do honestly think 
your cautious readers will find many statements in 
your documents which it will be difficult to believe 
bear the stamp of "sincerity." But let this kind of 
talk pass. Our readers will form their own conclu- 
sions, and I think will not need our aid in making up 
their verdict. 

Still, as you undertook to lead me out of the fogs 
of Bibleism into the ethereal light of Spiritualism, and 
as your arguments are directly for my conversion, I 
submit that it is allowable that I should pronounce 
my judgment on the arguments by which you would 
convince me. I did not expect to re-convert you to 
Christianity. That would be. I dare say, a hopeless 
task. For to such ones as yourself I believe the words 
of Paul forcibly apply : — 

" For it is impossible for those who were once en- 
lightened, and have tasted of the heavenly gift, and 
were made partakers of the Holy Ghost, and have 
tasted the good word of God, and the powers of the 
world to come, if they shall fall away, to renew them 
8 



114 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY? 

again unto repentance ; seeing they crucify to them- 
selves the Son of God afresh, and put him to an open 
shame." Heb. vi. 4-6. 
Now to your arguments. 

1. "It was no matter how good a man was ; he 
did not obey the truth, but lived in unrighteousness, 
if he failed to comply with the forms, ceremonies, and 
ordinances preached by Paul." 

This is a " hefty " declaration, and if it were true, 
would, in my estimation, certainly damage the teach- 
ing of Paul. But it is not true. Nowhere do I find 
Paul putting " forms, ceremonies, and ordinances " 
before purity of heart and life. According to my 
reading, Paul gives forms, &c, the last and most in- 
significant place. When you adduce a bit of proof to 
sustain this assertion, I will give it respectful consid- 
eration. 

2. "It was simply Jesus' obedience, and a belief in 
that, that made people righteous in Paul's estimation. 
See Rom. v. 19." 

I have examined your proof text, and do not find 
your statement in it. Here it is: "For as by one 
man's disobedience many were made sinners, so by the 
obedience of one shall many be made righteous." 

Now, it would be just as rational for you to affirm 
that " it was simply Adam's disobedience, and a be- 
lief in that, that made people wicked " in Paul's esti- 
mation, as to utter the statement you do. 

3. "It was Abraham's belief, and not his good 
works, that made him righteous. Rom. iv. 3." 

1. Your text reads, " For what saith the Scrip- 
ture? Abraham believed God, and it was counted 
unto him for righteousness." You have excepted 



packer's fifth letter. 115 

good works here, which Paul has not. He does not 
specially mention them. But he makes his statement 
in full view of " what saith the Scripture " ? 

2. The words of the apostle James are conclusive 
against you in this particular : Was not Abraham, 
our father, justified by works when he had offered 
Isaac, his son, upon the altar ? Seest thou how faith 
wrought with his works, and by works was faith 
made perfect? And the Scripture was fulfilled 
which saith, Abraham believed God, and it was im- 
puted unto him for righteousness : and he was called 
the friend of God. Ye see, then, how that by works 
a man is justified, and not by faith only. James 
ii. 21-24. 

You do not, so far as I am able to judge, under- 
stand Paul's doctrine of righteousness at all. And it 
seems to me to be a waste of time to controvert what 
proceeds from a total misapprehension of the great 
apostle's doctrine. 

Your whole effort appears to be, to make me be- 
lieve that Paul looks upon sin as the foundation of 
all good in human life and history. I think I have 
conclusively shown the erroneousness of this position, 
and by barely referring to the proofs submitted, I am 
willing to let the matter pass for the judgment of our 
readers. 

3. Your supposition that Conybeare and Howson 
" tried to dodge " the difficulty in Rom. vi. 17, mer- 
its no attention whatever. 

II. I shall suffer your reply to my explanation of 
Jer. xlviii. 10, to pass for what it is worth. I think, 
however, it would be better to show wherein my ex- 
planation was wrong, than to enter upon a general 



116 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY? 

work of scolding me for so successfully meeting your 
position. Until you do show, by sound reasoning, 
that my disposition of that passage is incorrect, I 
shall take it for granted that you feel the correctness 
of my views. 

III. I deny again that Paul was an enemy to 
learning, in any sense. He did condemn that pedan- 
tic pride of the so-called philosophers of his day, 
which did not suffer them to take into proper consid- 
eration the grand facts developed by the gospel. 

I do not think you strengthen your cause by al- 
luding to 1 Cor. ii. 1-5. When Paul elevates the 
"demonstration of the Spirit and of power," he does 
not declare the inutility of science, knowledge, and 
art. Circumstances alter cases. Paul was writing to 
a body of Christians, some of whom were inoculated 
with the speculations of Grecian and Oriental philos- 
ophy. That philosophy was more of imagination 
than of fact. Indeed, it was in the way of fact. 
When Lord Bacon published to the world his " Or- 
ganum," then the inutility of speculation was clearly 
enunciated. From that time, learning was less in 
word, more "in deed and in truth;" i. e., more the 
result of experiment, fact. So Paul would have the 
Corinthians less beguiled by the imagination, and 
more under the control of demonstrated facts. In 
fact, I see in Paul's communication to the Corinthian 
church the seed which afterward found so full fruit- 
fulness in the canons of Lord Bacon. Thus Paul, to 
my mind, instead of being the foe of all learning, is 
really the father of the true inductive philosophy. 

It is strange the infidel Lyttleton, when he was 
sifting the conversion and life of Paul for evidence 



Parker's fifth letter. 117 

to condemn Christianity, did not see as you do the 
apostle's hostility toward learning, which he cer- 
tainly would have done had Paul been really opposed 
to true philosophy in any sense. The noble lord not 
only failed to find this fault in the apostle, but he also 
found developed in his history overwhelming reasons 
why he should cease from infidelity, and become a 
devout Christian. 

IV. I am aware of the fact that this exchange of 
friendly letters has assumed somewhat of the char- 
acter of a written discussion. But I am not fearful 
of having fixed upon me any ''misrepresentations" 
of facts. I think I indite my thoughts with mod- 
erate care, and I seldom venture to make a statement 
until I feel secure in making it. 

When, therefore, I said, in my fourth letter to you, 
" I am glad you so candidly confess that Spiritualism 
can not give us better writers," &c, &c, than are given 
us by the Bible, I certainly said, what I then felt jus- 
tified in saying, and what I now feel justified in re- 
peating. I asked you to show me that Spiritualism 
could give us better writers, facts, principles, &c. ; 
and as you made not the least effort to do so, but 
evaded the point in toto, by a " suppose I can't," &c, 
I took this plain evasion to be a clear confession of 
inability to do so. And I shall be obliged to believe 
Spiritualism herein a failure, until your catalogue of 
better things shall be forthcoming. 

There are, remember, more ways than one in which 
a confession may be made. What if you have not 
"with pen or voice" said, in so many words, that 
Spiritualism fails to give the world better authors, 
facts, promises, commandments, &c, than the Bible ; 



118 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY? 

still, when I ask you fairly to give us the better 
things of Spiritualism, you fail or refuse to do so. 
What can I consider this other than a plain confes- 
sion of inability to do so ? 

V. You accuse rne of pettifogging in order to 
shield Moses from the imputation of murder. I 
freely admit the killing on the part of Moses, but I 
positively deny the damning circumstance of the 
fact — "malice aforethought." And besides, I say, 
Justice will try the man by the moral standard of his 
own day, and not by that of a thousand years after 
his death. Moses Hull, tried by the conscience and 
law of A. D. 3000, will fall far short of « holiness." 
So with the best men of all ages. Compared with 
the men of his day, Moses has nothing to fear. And 
by the justice of his own clay he falls or stands, and 
not by any verdict either you or I can pass upon him. 

The second paragraph in your sixth section shall 
pass unnoticed. 

VI. I shall say no more touching the point in con- 
troversy in your seventh section. 

VII. You desire me to give proof " that Jesus was 
in Egypt only once, and then only one year." 

I hardly think the burden of proof devolves upon 
me. You affirm that Jesus taught Egyptianism, and 
that he learned it in Egypt. In reply to this gratui- 
tous and unsupported assertion, I intimated that the 
only reliable documents on earth that give the facts 
in the history of Jesus clearly show that he was in 
Egypt only once, and then for not probably more 
than one year. Hence your charge of Egyptianism 
is without proof. 

Matt. ii. 14, says Joseph " took the young child" 



paekee's fifth lettee. 119 

and departed into Egypt. Matt. ii. 20, says, " He arose 
and took the young child . . . and came into the land 
of Israel." Nothing is said as to the length of time 
between these two events. Only one thing is certain — 
that a young child, and the same young child, went down 
into and was carried up out of the land of Egypt. 
His stay there may have "been one year or two years ; 
but it was not long enough for him to be schooled in 
Egyptianism. Now, if you have good proof that Jesus 
was ever afterward, and for a longer time, in Egypt, 
please adduce it. 

VIII. You ask me, " How do you know that Jonah 
preached to the Ninevites in order to lead to reforma- 
tion?" 

1. I know it from the fact that his preaching pro- 
duced that effect upon the king and his subjects. See 
Jonah iii. 5-10. 

2. Again, Jesus said the Ninevites " repented at 
the preaching of Jonah." Matt. xii. 41. 

3. I have said on this point all that need be said ; 
but to avoid the possibility of your using my silence 
as an indication of the difficulty of your other ques- 
tions, I will proceed to answer them in detail, even at 
the risk of repeating what I may have said before. 

1st. " Why was it necessary to preach a lie to re- 
form those people who did not know their right hand 
from their left ? " 

1. This is, to my mind, " a foolish question." 

2. The preaching was not to reform that class of 
"people," for they needed no reformation. 

3. He did not preach a lie. He simply denounced 
a judgment, which was conditional, as is evident from 
the passage already indicated. 



120 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY ? 

2d. " Why should Jonah lament the failure of his 
prophecy when they repented, if their repentance was 
to cause the salvation of the city ? " 

1. Jonah was a servant, and sent to preach the 
city's destruction. He had but one thing to do, and 
he did it. 

2. God was under no obligation to give Jonah a 
knowledge of all his intentions, any more than I am 
compelled to instruct my messenger, whom I send on 
a special errand, with all of my intentions. 

3. I dare say Jonah did not know all of his Master's 
intentions, and he wept because of that fact. 

4. Jonah was evidently quite unmerciful toward 
the heathen ; but this error was subsequently de- 
monstrated to him. 

5. You seem to find fault with God, and to accuse 
Jonah of being a false prophet, because God did not 
destroy "that great city," "wherein were more than 
six score thousand persons that could not discern be- 
tween their right and their left hand, and also much 
cattle." Jonah iv. 11. 

6. But suppose God had done just what Jonah 
denounced against the city ; what would you have 
said ? Would you have been better satisfied ? In 
that case you might have given Jonah the credit of 
having been a true prophet, but you would have ac- 
cused God with perpetrating an abominable and in- 
discriminate murder. I do not see how it is possible 
to satisfy you or your colleagues. 

3d. " Was Jonah's prophecy conditioned on the 
wickedness of the people ? " 

Allow me to assure you that you have no authority 
for calling Jonah's preaching "prophecy." Jonah 



Parker's fifth letter. 121 

does not call it "prophecy " nor does the historian of 
Jonah call it so ; nor does any other Bible writer 
known to me call it so. Neither should you call it 
prophecy. There is a wide difference between preach- 
ing and prophesying. Jonah was a preacher, but not 
a prophet. He was no more a prophet, in the true 
sense of the term, when he simply denounced judg- 
ment upon the city for its wickedness, than is a 
Methodist preacher who denounces " hell " upon the 
impenitent at death. First prove that Jonah was a 
prophet, prove that he made any pretensions to that 
office, and then you may have perhaps a shadow of a 
basis for your charge of failure upon him. Until you 
do make good at least one of these points, jovly affirma- 
tions will deserve no further notice. 

4th. Your third question deserves no attention. 

IX. As to Mrs. Hardinge I have no more to say. 
I am glad you say she is a Spiritualist. That fact is 
all I want ; for it proves that the Bible by at least one 
4 'star" in the spiritualistic heavens is treated with 
becoming respect — that in her estimation the Jewish 
law, which you consider so abominable, was simply 
"perfect" and accomplished its end. ' 

X. Walter Scott's Demonstration may be scoffed 
at — it can not be answered. I perceive that you 
have a happy way of getting out of logical difficulties. 
When your knowledge of the matter in dispute is 
exhausted, and when an unanswerable document is 
offered for your inspection, you simply invent a ridicu- 
lous evasion, and drop the subject. This is an old 
trick, in which there is now no deception. 

I have borrowed nothing from Walter Scott in thia 
controversy, as I have yet no need of borrowing capi- 



122 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY? 

tal. You put me to a very limited expenditure of 
resources, and I assure you I have ample means on 
hand of my own to meet all the demands you can 
make upon me. 

When the evidences for Christianity come legiti- 
mately before us, you will find me sufficiently pre- 
pared. 

XI. Those hogs nevertheless were spiritualist me- 
diums ; for a medium is one possessed of a demon — a 
dead person's spirit. This you can not deny. I shall 
admit that those spirits in pork did do two things — 
confess Jesus as the Son of God, and immerse them- 
selves. All that is clear ; but their immersions were 
their destruction. Hence I learn that even the per- 
formance, by spiritualistic mediums, of some things 
enjoined on others for salvation, is everlasting destruc- 
tion to said mediums. If those hogs got into my 
church, as you say, remember they got into it to 
perish ; let your mediums see the point, and be careful 
never to be found where they must as mediums for- 
ever perish. 

XII. Your comment on " well drunk," is too glar- 
ing a perversion to need further notice. I affirm again 
that there is not a fact in the entire passage that a 
soul was in any degree of intoxication at any period 
of the feast. Your manufactured " that is," is Moses 
Hull, and not John the apostle. 

XIII. I am glad you consider my submissions to 
the jury good arguments. I agree with you they are' 
my best arguments for this reason, that to submit 
what you frequently write to persons of common sense 
is to at once seal its doom. I am glad you are aware 
of this fact. 



paeker's fifth lettek. 123 

XIV. Your eighteenth item introduces the ques- 
tion of "Evil." I do not see how the discussion of 
the question, "How did evil come into the world?" 
will be any advantage to either side at this time. I 
think I am fully able to show, 1, That some " evil " is 
really good, because its consequences are good only ; 
2. That some "evil" (sin) is really bad, because its 
present and future consequences are bad only; 3. 
That God is the author of certain instruments and 
agents by which " evil "(suffering) and " evil " (sin) 
are produced : the first " evil " (suffering) is directly 
from his laws, and always good in its design and con- 
sequences ; the second " evil " (sin) is exclusively the 
act of the created agents (man), it being, to my mind, 
impossible for God to make man, and yet to deny him 
the power to sin, if he desires to do so. This power 
to sin denied to man, he would not have been man — 
he would not have had human nature ; 4. That " evil " 
(sin) can be and is in the world, and that neither the 
goodness nor power of God is therefore compromised. 
I think your captious question, " God is either weak 
or wicked — which is it ? " proceeds from a want of 
understanding. But I am prepared, at the proper 
time, to admit the presence and power of " evil " in 
the world, and to prove that that fact does not justify 
the supposition that therefore " God is either weak or 
wicked." I think you had better be bringing out 
the beauties of Spiritualism for our inspection, than 
wasting your time in profitless questions, far from the 
object of your letters. 

XV. The last part of your letter, which was written 
on a slip of paper, is lost ; and hence I must pass it 



124 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY ? 

without remark. If there was anything of importance 
in it, please notify me in your next. 

XVI. In conclusion, allow me to say, that I have 
not time just now to pay attention to your views on 
marriage. Perhaps you will develop them more fully 
in your sixth letter. If you do, I will then pay them 
respectful attention. 

Yours, truly, 

W. F. Parker. 



125 



MOSES HULL'S SIXTH LETTER, 

Boston, Mass., September 14, 1872. 

Brother Parker : Your reply to my last was a 
long time getting written, and still longer getting to 
me. The accompanying reasons for tardiness are ac- 
cepted as all-sufficient. While your letter seems to 
lack the vigor and logic of former letters, the most of 
it makes up in candor what it lacks in argument. As 
I have important matter to bring out, and the most 
of your letter only touches points already before the 
jury, you will pardon me if I remain silent on many 
of them. 

I. You and Paul give me the consolation of know- 
ing that my case is hopeless. "Impossible to renew 
them again to repentance." Well, be it so; until I 
hear something better than you have presented, it 
will indeed be impossible. I have done just what 
Paul told me to do. I have "left the first principles 
of the doctrine of Christ, and gone on unto perfection, 
not laying again the foundation of repentance from 
dead works and faith toward God, of the doctrine 
of baptisms, and the laying on of hands, and of resur- 
rection of the dead, and of eternal judgment." Heb. 
vi. 1, 2. Probably Paul knew as well as yourself that 
when a person renounces the nonsense preached in 
the name of Christianity, he hardly ever returns to 
it. Christianity is like the small-pox ; it seldom at- 
tacks the same person twice. 



126 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY? 

II. You miss it terribly in quoting James' words 
to show Paul's belief with regard to " good works." 
Please let Paul represent himself. Paul's religion 
consisted almost wholly of forms and ceremonies, while 
James had little or no use for them. His religion was 
to " visit the fatherless and the widows in their afflic- 
tion, and keep himself unspotted from the world." 
James says, " Ye see, then, how that by works a man 
is justified, and not by faith only. Jas. ii. 24. Paul 
saj^s, " By grace are ye saved, through faith, and that 
not of yourselves ; it is the gift of God. Not of works, 
lest any man should boast." Eph. ii. 8, 9. 

III. You have made the important discovery that 
Paul, instead of being opposed to wisdom, as he teaches, 
is a true philosopher — really " the father of the true 
inductive philosophy." O, shade of Bacon! Philos- 
ophers will consider that the best joke of the season. 
Brother, you are acknowledged to be a good joker ; 
but such jokes on so serious a matter, and at the ex- 
pense of Lord Bacon, are just a little out of season. 

IV. You err in taking my evasion of certain points 
you undertake to make for confessions that you are 
right. When I confess a point, it is for argument sake, 
or because it is true. I evade points because they are 
entirely irrelevant to any issue between us. As there 
is no dispute between us yet as to which was the best 
medium, David, Paul, Swedenborg, or A. J. Davis, 
the only point being, are the latter inspired at all, I 
have not as yet found it necessary to dispute as to 
who has given us the best writings. Were you to 
deny that the rain which is falling to-day is wet, I 
should not undertake to prove that it was more wet 
than showers which fell upon Abraham. I should be 



hull's sixth letter. 127 

content with, proving its moisture. Then you, by 
your course of reasoning, would torture that into a 
confession that there was more moisture in water in 
Abraham's day than now ! You would, as in this 
case, be welcome to all you would make. 

V. Why do you contrast the moral standard of 
Moses' day with that of the present ? If it was as 
good as that of to-day, there is no room for a contrast ; 
if not, why urge me to give up present inspiration for 
the past ? My great objection to the Bible is, that it 
is but the child of the moral, mental, and theological 
standards of the nations and times in which it was 
written. We could now make a better one. 

VI. If you will investigate the history of Jesus 
from the time he was twelve years old until he was 
thirty, you will find the burden of proof on the side 
of his having spent that time in Egypt. 

VII. You discover that my sole aim is to be brief. 
All you have said about Jonah needs no reply ; its 
falsity or truthfulness can not affect the issues between 
us ; but as you demand positive proof that Jonah was 
a prophet, you shall have it. The proof is the fol- 
lowing : — 

1. He prophesied. Jonah iii. 4. 

2. Jesus said, "An evil and adulterous generation 
seeketh after a sign, and there shall no sign be given 
it but the sign of the prophet Jonas" Matt. xii. 39. 
Brother, be more careful of your assertions ; your re- 
peated assertion that Jonah was not a prophet, like 
many other things you say, will hurt you. 

VIII. It is strange that you should introduce the 
doctrine of " whatever is, is right," as a principal ob- 
jection to Spiritualism, and, when I meet you at every 



128 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY ? 

point, reply with, "I think you had better be bring- 
ing out the beauties of Spiritualism for our instruction 
than wasting your time with profitless questions." 
Why did you not think of these " questions " being 
" profitless " when you introduced them? Now that 
you have, after exhausting your store of arguments 
against them, found them to be "profitless," I hope 
you will confine yourself in the future to questions 
that can profit somebody. 

IX. There, I have gone through your letter, and 
though I found no point in it really deserving a reply, 
I have taken every sentence that could be tortured to 
look like an argument against my position, and re- 
viewed it. The other points in your letter are so 
perfectly irrelevant, and such outrageous quibbles, 
that they need no aid of mine to throw them down. 

X. I remember my promise to lay before you in 
this letter some of the reasons for believing in the 
spiritual phenomena. I believe you already under- 
stand that I was a materialist, or soul-sleeper, before 
Spiritualism came to my rescue. I had searched the 
Bible in vain for evidences of immortality. If I found 
historical records of phenomena in that book that went 
far toward proving the return of the dead, I always 
found positive authoritative declarations, in the same 
book, denying the immortality of the human soul. Thus 
my phenomenal evidences were balanced by what I re- 
garded as being more positive and perfect inspiration. 
Did the Bible talk of Samuel's return (1 Sam. xxviii.), 
— it also said, " The dead know not anything, neither 
have they any more a reward ; for the memory of 
them is forgotten, also their love and their hatred, and 
their envy is now perished. Neither have they any 



hull's sixth letter. 129 

more a portion forever in anything that is done under 
the sun." Eccl. ix. 4, 6. 

Did the Bible speak of the handwriting coming 
from Elijah the prophet (2 Chron. xxi. 12), — it also 
said, " Put not your trust in princes, nor in the son 
of man, in whom is no help, for his breath goeth 
forth, he returneth to his earth, in that very day his 
thoughts perish." Ps. cxlvi. 3, 4. Did the Bible 
speak of the return of Moses and Elias, or John's 
brother (Matt. xvii. 1-5 ; Rev. xxii. 8, 9), — this 
evidence to my mind was neutralized by the declara- 
tion concerning a dead man. " His sons come to honor, 
and he knoweth it not ; they are brought low, and he 
perceiveth it not of them." Job xiv. 21. Thus my 
belief in the infallibility of those authoritative dec- 
larations destroyed my faith in the historical facts 
to which I have just referred. 

XL More mature reflection has convinced me that 
biblical writers would be more likely to be correct in 
recording historical facts than in giving hypotheses 
concerning them. This taught me to accept their 
facts as such, and their statements with regard to the 
state of the dead, the gods, angels, devils, and, in 
fact, any theoretic statement, as theory, — nothing 
more. This gave me a new mode of interpreting the 
Bible, and all other ancient books. I then went 
into a comparison of ancient and modern phenomena, 
and found them the same, and that either, when cor- 
roborated by the other, contained a sufficient proof 
of the immortality of the human soul. 

Brother Parker, I withstood the batteries of the pul- 
pits and press ; all the eloquence and logic that could 
be brought to bear was not sufficient to make me be- 
9 



130 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY? 

lieve in immortality until I saw this harmony between 
science and modern Spiritualism. In this I am only 
a representative of a large class who have reached the 
44 knowledge of eternal life " through the same source. 
Can you take it from us ? Will you ? If so, there is 
nothing left for us but materiality, mortality, death, 
annihilation ! 

XII. Evidences of the spiritual phenomena are so 
numerous that there are few now who would deny 
them. Here is an extract which I clip from this 
morning's Providence Journal. It contains proof 
enough to show the return of those whom we call 
dead. 

" A young lady from New York has been visiting 
relatives in Providence, living on the west side, dur- 
ing the past two weeks, and had made all arrange- 
ments to return home last Friday night, having a 
strong impression upon her mind that she must go 
home without delay. For the sake of the company of a 
relative on her journey, however, she was induced to 
postpone her departure till Monday morning last. 
Sunday morning last, after a quiet night's rest, she 
was suddenly awakened between three and four 
o'clock; and, as soon as she was aroused, she saw a 
figure distinctly, or was convinced she did, standing 
in her room, near a door, looking toward her, which 
bore an exact resemblance to a sister that she had left 
at home in New York in her usual health, and had 
not been informed of her being ill. The young ]ady 
was not alarmed by the vision, or apparition, but got 
up and went toward it, when it disappeared. She 
then opened a window and looked, but saw nothing 
more of the figure, or anything else unusual enough 



131 

to attract attention, returned to her room, retired, and 
feel asleep again. In a short time she was awakened, 
and saw the apparition of her sister again, with the 
same life-like appearance, and in the same position as 
before, and got up again ; and as she advanced toward 
it, it receded from her approach and disappeared as be- 
fore. Again she looked about from room to room, and 
out of the window, but saw nothing more of it. Being 
now too much excited to sleep longer, she dressed her- 
self, and remained sitting up in her chamber, waiting 
for daylight to come. Her uncle, who is an early riser, 
heard her moving about her room ; and on his inquir- 
ing why she was up so early, she related her experi- 
ence and vision as stated above, and when the family 
had all risen it was the subject of general remark and 
comment. Sunday noon the young lady received a 
dispatch from New York informing her that her sis- 
ter, whose presence she thought she saw twice in her 
chamber, at four o'clock in the morning, had died at 
home quite suddenly, at that hour." 

I will not comment on this extract. I have not 
given it because it is the best I have, but because it is 
the first at hand, and from a secular paper. 

XIII. The following letter from Mrs. T. B. Cranz, 
in a recent number of the Banner of Light, speaks 
for itself: — 

" I feel I can not too publicly proclaim the wonder- 
ful tests given through Dr. Slade, of 210 West Forty- 
Third St., New York city, and of the perfect spirit 
pictures taken by W. H. Mumler, of West Spring- 
field St., Boston. I was a firm Orthodox ; was a 
member, with my husband, of the Dutch Reformed 
Church here for twenty years. One year ago last 



132 SPIRITUALISM OR. CHRISTIANITY ? 

September, I sat at the death-bed of my husband's 
sister, who was a member of the same church with 
myself. 

"As she was dying, the scales dropped from her 
eyes ; she saw the shining ones around her bed, and 
called them by name. Among the number were our 
two little ones, Willie and Linda, who had passed 
over several years before. 

" She called them by name, and declared they, with 
many others, were with her ; and in bidding farewell 
to her little boy, who was in tears at her bedside, she 
said, 4 Cheer up, my boy, and remember that although 
you may not see mamma, yet God will sometimes let 
my spirit come down, and hover around my little 
ones.' This made such an impression on me that I 
mentioned it to a friend who happened to be a Spirit- 
ualist. She directed me to Dr. Slade. I went last 
May, and there I received some beautiful communi- 
cations, written on the slate, with my dear little ones, 
names signed in full, with a request that I should go 
to Mr. Mumler's, and they would try and show them- 
selves to me. The doctor was an entire stranger to 
me. I had never met him before ; it was impossible 
for him to know who I was. Then, in August last, I 
went to Mr. Mumler's. I had never met the artist 
before ; and it was impossible for him to know whom 
I hoped to get in spirit form. 

" He asked me no questions; I sat alone for my pic- 
ture ; and when he brought the plate to me, I was 
struck with wonder. 

" A complete group surrounded me. On one side 
of me stood our darling Linda, and on the other our 
dear Willie, close nestled at my side ; and a lit- 



hull's sixth letter. 133 

tie back stood my father, yet plain to be seen ; and 
with her' arms clasped around rny neck is my aunt, 
whose face I at first could not recognize, as she died 
when I was very young ; but it has been fully recog- 
nized since by those who knew her." 

With an extract from Rev. T. B. Taylor, A. B., 
M. D., in the same number of the Banner of Light, I 
will close this letter. 

" Another form of mediumship is doing a great 
work in this country, as well as elsewhere ;-and that 
is, the power to heal the sick. 

" Not long ago I removed a tumor, or wen, from 
the shoulder of one of our leading citizens of this 
city, a Mr. George W. Crane, of the firm of Crane & 
Byron, without the dissecting-knife. It created quite 
a sensation. Modesty forbids me to speak of many 
other cases of as wonderful a • character ; but I can 
with propriety speak of the still more wonderful 
mediumship of that strangely endowed man, Dr. P. 
B. Jones, of Atchison, Kan. There seems to be no 
disease that flesh is heir to which does not yield readi- 
ly to his wonderful magnetic powers. I know him 
and his works. . They testify of him. Here he has 
rebuked fevers, lockjaw, St. Vitus Dance ; withered 
hand and arm have also been restored ; so that, in 
this 4 staid old Orthodox town,' people exclaim, ' How 
strange ! ' Mediumship is what the people want. May 
there be many more laborers called into this field." 

The difficulty with this whole question of the spirit- 
ual phenomena is, the proofs are so abundant, that the 
chief trouble is in culling from the vast mass of ma- 
terial. Volumes ten times the size of our letters, all 
combined, might be filled. 



134 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY? 

In these extracts you find not only the proof of 
spirit identity, but some of the good being done by 
spirit communion. 

Hoping to hear from you soon, 

I am, as ever, yours, &c, 

Moses Hull. 



W. F. PARKER'S SIXTH REPLY. 

" Cedar Hill," near La Grange, Ky., 
September 25, 1872. 

Brother Hull : Your letter, dated at Boston, 14th 
inst., was put into my hand when I reached home last 
night. I shall now reply to it as fully as the time 
will allow, and as your matter shall demand. 

Your letters are getting remarkably short, which 
may be an improvement, provided you make each one 
"brief, but strong." I do not know whether you are 
failing to find material to keep up your usual volubil- 
ity, or are disposed to give us your documents in a 
concentrated form, but with more frequency. If the 
latter, I am pleased with your idea, and shall hence- 
forth expect sterner pleading for the claims of Spirit- 
ualism than we have heretofore had. 

But on carefully inspecting your last letter, I do 
not see that it manifests any more strength than do its 
predecessors; in fact, your sudden determination to 
abbreviate has shattered your logical strength, and 
the document before me seems to be a " sick child." 
Your next one will be better. 



Parker's sixth letter. 135 

Always bear in mind that the object of your writ- 
ing is to convert me from the fables of Christianity to 
the better things of modern Spiritualism. I thank 
you for making this effort. If I love anything on 
earth, it is truth ; and I am independent enough to 
embrace it, whenever and wherever found. If I am 
in error, I desire to know ; and for me to know an 
error, is to reject it at once and forever. 

Up to the present time, I have failed to see, in all 
that you have said, any reasons why I should reject 
the Bible for the documents of modern Spiritualism. 
You will not point out to me the superior charac- 
teristics of the inspiration of A. J. Davis, Mrs. Har- 
clinge, Wheeler, Peebles, &c, &c. Unless I can see 
in them something more deserving my veneration and 
confidence than I can see in Paul, Peter, and other 
apostles, I shall remain quite unwilling to exchange 
my " prophets." I wish you would pay some atten- 
tion to this particular, and show me by unanswerable 
testimony that my morals and safety will be more 
secure by following either one of your colleagues 
named than by following the teachings of the New 
Testament teachers. 

I had hoped to find in your second letter a fuller 
presentation of your views of marriage. But as you 
have added no more, I shall not spend space by con- 
troverting what you have said. 

I will now pay a little attention to the points which 
you enumerate in your last letter. 

I. Your first point is burdened, to my mind, with 
a strange error. You seem to assume that Christian- 
ity, once rejected, is never again adopted. Paul knew 
nothing like tins. And the experience of multitudes 



136 SPIRITUALISM OB CHRISTIANITY? 

is against it. Many have rejected Christianity for 
Spiritualism ; and again have rejected Spiritualism 
for Christianity. And these changes have been sin- 
cere ones, too. 

Christianity, to be enjoyed, must be understood. 
Many, not understanding it, have tried something 
called ''Christianity," and have rejected that. But 
I never knew a man to reject Christianity who really 
understood it. Nor do I believe you would to-day be 
fighting the Bible if you really had apprehended what 
that Bible teaches to humanity. Now, to show you 
that the above remarks are true, allow me to place 
before you the following letter from Joseph Barker. 

Mr. Barker at one time, in England, was known as 
a champion against the opponents of the Bible, and 
he published a work there entitled " Christianity 
Triumphant" He afterward rejected Christianity, 
and became an avowed Atheist. But he returned, 
after his trial of "deism" and "atheism," to Chris- 
tianity again, and five years ago wrote to C. Collins, 
Jr., the following letter : — 

Victor Place, William Street, Southport, ^ 
Lancashire, England, Nov. 21, 1867. > 

Rev. C. Collins, Jr., Philadelphia. 

My Dear Sir : I am happy to be able to say that 
I have " entirely renounced the views I formerly held 
with regard to the divine authority of the sacred Scrip- 
tures," and that I have now for nearly five years been 
advocating "the gospel of Christ as the only antidote 
for sin, and the sovereign remedy for the healing of 
the nations." 

The change did not take place suddenly; it was 



PARKER'S SIXTH LETTER. 137 

spread over several years ; nor can I trace it to any 
one event, or man, or book. I believe it commenced 
while I was in Nebraska, and advanced somewhat 
irregularly from that time to its happy consmnmation 
in 1863. 

A correspondence which commenced between me 
and the Rev. Dr. Cooke, of London, in 1862, was of 
great service in accelerating the change, and bringing 
it to a happy issue. 

But to give you an account of the process in a let- 
ter would be impossible. I am thinking of preparing 
a statement for the press, and when it is published, I 
shall be glad, if 3 r ou desire it, to forward a copy or 
two to your address. If the post office regulations 
allow me, I will forward to you, along with this letter, 
copies of the pamphlets I have published since my 
return to Christ. I would send you one I published 
on the Bible, but it is out of print. I have often 
wished to write to Dr. Berg, but I was told he had 
left Philadelphia. 

I expected to return to Philadelphia before this, 
but the state of my wife's health has thus far ren- 
dered it impossible. 

I desire very much to have an opportunity of mak- 
ing known to my former hearers and readers the 
change which has taken place in my views and feel- 
ings, and the considerations and influences by which, 
under God, it has been effected. 

You are perfectly at liberty to publish this state- 
ment in any way you think well. So far from having 
any objection to its publication, you will greatly 
oblige me by giving it as extensive a circulation as 
possible. All I should ask is, that if my statement 



138 SPIRITUALISM OE CHRISTIANITY? 

be accompanied with any remarks, they shall be such 
as shall have no tendency to exasperate my old unbe- 
lieving friends. Many of them were . very kind to 
me ; and in every case, meekness, and gentleness, and 
love, are best calculated to win skeptics and unbe- 
lievers to Christ and his cause. 

I am in connection with the Episcopal church, 
though my labors as a lecturer and preacher have 
been mostly in connection with the primitive Meth- 
odists and other dissenting denominations. 

Lamenting that I should ever have erred, but re- 
joicing that I have been so happily restored, I am, 
my dear sir, Yours, most respectfully, 

Joseph Barker. 

In addition to the foregoing, I desire to call your 
attention to another extract, taken from a speech of 
Mr. Barker since his return to Christianity. 

" To you, young men, who are beginning to enter- 
tain skeptical views, let me offer a word of counsel 
and warning. I assure you, you know not what you 
are doing. The path on which you are entering may 
seem right to you in your present state of mind, but 
the end thereof is death. You are preparing for 
yourselves matter for bitter repentance. 

" 1 have trod the dreadful path, from beginning to 
end. I know it all. It is a weary and dismal road, 
and it leads to wretchedness and ruin. I have seen 
the terrible effects which infidelity produces on men's 
characters. I have had proof of its deteriorating in- 
fluence in my own experience. Its tendency is to 
utter debasement. I have studied both sides, and 
what is more, I have tried both, and the result is a 



parker's sixth letter. 139 

full assurance that infidelity is madness, and that the 
religion of Christ is the perfection of wisdom and 
goodness. 

" I think of my wanderings in the dark shades of 
doubt and unbelief with unspeakable sorrow. I 
would give a world if I could have my time to live 
over again, that I might avoid the dreadful mistake I 
made in turning my back on Christ and his cause, 
and joining the ranks of his enemies. The only com- 
fort I have is, that I was permitted to return while in 
the fullness of my health and strength, and in the full 
vigor of my mental powers; that I am allowed to 
speak for Christ and Christianity once more ; that my 
family are all happy in the love of God, and in the 
faith of the gospel ; and that my large and varied ex- 
perience enables me to speak of the infinite excellency 
of religion with an assurance, and to substantiate 
what I say with a kind of evidence which, without 
such an experience, might have been impossible. 

" I have no inducement to address you thus but re- 
gard to your welfare, and to the welfare of those 
over whom your influence may extend, and a sense 
of duty to that great, good God who is the Father of 
us all. I owe it to you, I owe it to all, to make 
known the result of my life-long experience ; and 
this is the reason why I speak. I know that virtue 
is necessary to happiness, and that religion is neces- 
sary to virtue, and that Christianity is religion, and 
virtue, and happiness, in their highest and divinest 
forms. I have proved its power, I have felt its 
worth, I have tasted its blessedness, I have seen its 
elevating and cheering power in others, near and dear 
to me, in the hour of grievous suffering. It is — as 



140 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY ? 

the best and dearest creature I know on earth said to 
me not long ago, when apparently drawing near to 
death — it is ' the pearl of great price ; the one 
thing needful.' 

" I could say more ; my heart is full, and would 
fain pour forth itself in prayers and entreaties to you 
to return to Christ. The man that leaves the religion 
of Christ for unbelief, or sinful pleasures, or worldly 
gains, makes a dreadful exchange. He leaves the 
fountains of living waters for cisterns that hold no 
water. Like the prodigal son, he leaves the home of 
his soul, and the love of the Father, for a far country, 
where, after his short, delusive pleasures, he must 
encounter the horrors of friendlessness and starva- 
tion. The prodigal was beside himself, and so are 
they who imitate his example. When the prodigal 
came to himself, he returned with shame and sadness 
to his father and his home again, and when you come 
to yourselves you will do the same. 

" God grant that it may be soon. God grant that 
you may be brought to see things in their true light, 
and to seek his mercy, and give yourselves to his ser- 
vice without delay. 

" Infidelity, and sin, and all that they can give, are 
but vanity and vexation of spirit ; but a life of faith 
on the Son of God, and of obedience to his gospel, 4 is 
profitable unto all things, having promise both of the 
life that now is and of that which is to come.' ' 

Joseph Barker is only one in tens of thousands. I 
need refer to no more. His testimony is to the point. 
He repudiated Christianity, and the result was 
" death." He returned to Christianity, and " lives 
again." Why, then, should you say, " Christianity is 



packer's sixth letter. 141 

like the small-pox ; it seldom attacks the same person 
twice"? I expect to see the day when Moses Hull 
will feelingly retract all that he has said against God, 
the Bible, and Christianity, though he may be a Spir- 
itualist still. 

II. I do not think, as you say, that I missed it 
when I quoted James to show that Paul believed in 
"works." Paul and James held the same opinions 
on the point in debate ; and the very fact that every 
one of Paul's letters is full of injunctions to clo good 
things, proves to a demonstration that Paul taught 
u good works " just as much as faith. Look at this : 
" Having, then, gifts differing according to the grace 
that is given to us, whether prophecy, let us prophesy 
according to the proportion of faith ; or ministry, let 
us wait on our ministering ; or he that teacheth, on 
teaching ; or he that exhorteth, on exhortation : he 
that giveth, let him do it with simplicity ; he that rul- 
eth, with diligence ; he that showeth mercy, with 
cheerfulness. Let love be without dissimulation. 
Abhor that which is evil ; cleave to that which is 
good. Be kindly afTectioned one to another with 
brotherly love, in honor preferring one another ; not 
slothful in business ; fervent in spirit ; serving the 
Lord ; rejoicing in hope ; patient in tribulation ; con- 
tinuing instant in prayer ; distributing to the neces- 
sity of saints ; given to hospitality. Bless them 
which persecute you ; bless, and curse not. Rejoice 
with them that do rejoice, and weep with them that 
weep. Be of the same mind one toward another. 
Mind not high things, but condescend to men of low 
estate. Be not wise in your own conceits. Recom- 
pense to no man evil for evil. Provide things honest 



142 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY? 

in the sight of all men. If it be possible, as much as 
lieth in you, live peaceably with all men." Rom. 
xii. 6-18. 

Some thirty good works are enjoined in this ex- 
tract, and no man repudiating good works could pos- 
sibly enjoin such things upon his disciples. This, 
brother, is a stern fact, and settles the dispute. Paul 
does not make good works secondary to anything — 
but love. 

You quote Eph. ii. 8, 9 : " For by grace are ye 
saved through faith ; and that not of yourselves : it is 
the gift of God : not of works, lest any man should 
boast." 

And of course the effect of that quotation is to 
make superficial readers conclude that Paul really 
ignored " works." But had you dealt with Paul just 
as you desire to be treated, you would have quoted 
just what he did say in this place on " good works." 
The very next verse says, — 

" For we are his workmanship, created in Christ 
Jesus unto good works, which God hath before or- 
dained that we should walk in them." 

Now, it would be difficult to dissuade from " good 
works" one taught that he had been created for the 
purpose of " good works." You had best surrender 
this point. You can gain nothing by kicking against 
the goad of Paul's own testimony. 

III. Yes, I am still of the opinion that the induc- 
tive philosophy is older than Lord Bacon. If I un- 
derstand Bacon, he would have all theories tested by 
experiment. If I understand Paul, he, too, would 
have his followers demonstrate their " theory " by 
experience, or experiment. Paul would have them 



Parker's sixth letter. 143 

" prove j^our own selves," and he would have them 
"prove all things," holding fast to that which exper- 
iment has demonstrated " good." Lord Bacon caught 
the idea, and gave us the "Novum Organum." Now, 
before one of our scientists will accept any theory, it 
must be " proved " by " experience" or experiment. 
In spite of your laugh about my being a " joker," I 
am still where I stood, and reaffirm that Paul was 
before Bacon as an inductive philosopher. 

IV. But there is a dispute between us about 
"which was the best medium (prophet), David, Paul, 
Swedenborg, or A. J. Davis." I think this is, and 
has been, the dispute. I think you have affirmed 
that the two latter are just as good mediums as the 
former ; in fact, I think your readers have inferred 
from your letters that you hold out the "inspiration " 
of the latter as better far than that of the former. I 
think I have denied clearly that either of the latter 
was "inspired" "at all." I use the word "inspira- 
tion " perhaps in a sense different from that which 
you give to it. Before we can argue this question at 
all, we must agree on the signification of the terms 
employed. Tell me what you mean by " inspiration." 
Give me the reasons why you believe Davis and Swe- 
denborg to be "inspired at all." Let us come to the 
point, and " try the spirits." 

Why do you accuse me of torturing your statements 
into confessions? I do not intend any such thing, 
and I can not believe I do so, until you shall give me 
a clear evidence of it. It is, my brother, much easier 
for you to say, " you torture," — I presume my points 
are afflictive, — than for you to disprove my positions. 

V. You say, " Why do you contrast the moral 



144 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY? 

teaching of Moses' day with that of the present ? If 
it was as good as that of to-day, there is no room for 
the contrast ; if not, why have me give up present 
inspiration for the past ? ' ' 

I do not know that I have "contrasted" these 
standards. I think I have taken this position, and I 
think it a correct one : — 

1. That the race is progressing ; 

2. That the era in which Moses lived was fourteen 
hundred years short of the era in which Christ lived ; 
and 

3. That as the race grows up to a standard, a new 
one will be provided, until that which is perfect is 
come. 

You can not find any fault in these positions, unless 
you deny the great Christian doctrine of growth in 
the race. Moses killed an Egyptian; hence you call 
him a " bloody murderer." I admit the fact, but I 
deny that he was a "murderer," in the Christian 
sense of that word. All killing is not murder. Some 
killing has no guilt at all attached to it ; other is jus- 
tifiable, and some is excusable. Moses killed one in 
beat of blood, even though he "looked this way and 
that way ; " still it was done in heat of blood, in de- 
fense of a "brother." That killing, too, had a mean- 
ing, which the Jacobite slaves did not understand. 
But I do not propose to vindicate Moses. I am will- 
ing to grant he perpetrated manslaughter ; but I 
affirm he did that at a time when his deeds can be 
made no plea against his claims as a prophet. 

My brother, I think I see hanging about you an error 
which you should speedily put far from you. That 
error is the dragging up of evil history to blacken the 



pabkee's sixth letter. 145 

reputation of human beings. You do not like Moses 
nor his religion — specially do you not like his re- 
ligion. You desire to kill the moral influence of his 
name and of his teachings. Now, how do you pro- 
ceed ? Why, you try to show that he was a bad man ; 
you drag out and brand every one of his faults ; you 
call him hard names indeed, and you infuse your 
hatred of him into the hearts of those who hear you. 
This course I do not like. It is too much like the con- 
duct of some who profess to -be Christians. These 
persons forget the cardinal rule of charity, and blacken 
the names of their brother Christians, by digging up 
every crime and fault which had been done "in sin." 
A religion which can not be blind to errors and faults 
is no religion for humanity. True Charity will never 
repeat the sorrowful paragraphs in any individual's his- 
tory. The fact that many Spiritualists so persistently 
and systematically proclaim the faults of the dead and 
of the living, is no commendation of the animus of 
Spiritualism. 

As for past standards, the New Testament gives us 
the last which has ever been given to the world. How 
long humanity will need that standard depends upon 
the moral growth of the race. We need no new one 
until the old one is outgrown. To say that the 
standard erected by Christ is outgrown, is to utter a 
proposition which no man can prove ; is to affirm that 
humanity has outgrown itself, and an infinitely perfect 
will is incapacitated to legislate for man. Alluding 
to the law of Christ as a fabric of the past, you say, 
" We could now make a better one." 

1. Who are the " we " to whom you allude ? 

2. In what would that " better " consist ? 

10 



146 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY? 

3. If "we could (can) now make a better one," 
why have we not done it ? 

4. If " we " means Spiritualists, I have not yet 
seen any evidences of their ability to give us a 
"better one." 

5. Suppose in your next letter you give me an out- 
line of the better moral standard which "we could 
now make." 

6. Until you do so I must say "we" can do no 
such thing. And "we" will need Christ's standard 
for some time yet to come. 

7. The " spirits " have said many things, but I am 
not yet aware that they have given to the world any 
moral principle not found in the Bible, although they 
have taken pains to decry many of the principles in 
that book enforced. 

"If you will investigate the history of Jesus from 
the time he was twelve years old until he was thirty, 
you will find the burden of proof on the side of his 
having spent that time in Egypt." 

Well, as investigation is my business, I will thank 
you if you will tell me where I can find the authentic 
documents to study. What eye-witnesses have given 
to the world their testimony ? Please give me " light," 
and dissipate my darkness. 

VI. This statement is true : " You discover that 
my sole aim is to be brief." This discovery I made 
at the beginning of your letter ; but I fondly hoped 
you intended to make brevity strong also ; now you 
take away from me my wish, and leave me a prey to 
my worst fears, that your " sole aim is brevity." Can 
"brevity" prove that Spiritualism is true? Nay. 
Your "sole aim" should have been sound reason- 
ing — not brevity. 



parker's sixth letter. 147 

As to Jonah, I will further say, — 

1. Jesus does call him a "prophet." Did I ever 
say he does not ? 

2. The word "prophet" in the New Testament 
means sometimes simply " preacher," and in this sense 
I think Jesus used it ; for he does not call what Jonah 
uttered " prophecy," but " preaching." " The men of 
Nineveh shall rise in the judgment with this genera- 
tion, and shall condemn it ; because they repented at 
the preaching of Jonas; and, behold, a greater than 
Jonas is here." Matt. xii. 41. 

VII. Your 8th and 9th sections demand no notice ; 
hence I give them none. 

VIII. You approach the " phenomena " of modern 
Spiritualism with considerable caution. I do not 
blame you for that. I am anxious to see the process 
through which you were carried from the damps and 
gloom of soul-sleeping, up into the warm sunshine of 
Spiritualism. Your first faith is just as unaccountable 
to me as your last. I see, so far, no more evidence 
for the one than for the other. 

You say, " I had searched the Bible in vain for evi- 
dences of immortality. If I found historical records 
of phenomena in that book that went far toward prov- 
ing the return of the dead, I always found positive 
authoritative declarations in the same book, denying 
the immortality of the human soul." 

I have no doubt you " searched the Bible in vain 
for evidences of immortality." Still, that does not 
prove that there are no evidences there. Others have 
found evidences there ; and I am amongst them. In 
fact, the Bible seems to me to be full of the doctrine 
of immortality ; so full that all the phenomena claimed 



148 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY ? 

by Spiritualists can add nothing to my faith. A good 
deal depends upon how the Bible is read. You con- 
fess that the " historical records " looked fully in the 
direction of immortality, but your trouble arose out 
of "■positive and authoritative declarations in the 
same book denying the immortality of the human 
soul;" and you quote, " The dead know not any- 
thing, neither have they any more a reward ; for the 
memory of them is forgotten, also their love and their 
hatred, and their envy is now perished. Neither have 
they any more a portion forever in anything that is 
done under the sun." Eccl. ix. 5, 6. 

Now, suppose I should say that there is no truth in 
your quotation, and that it was never spoken as a 
truth. Now, allow me to say, that this book of 
Ecclesiastes was written for the express purpose of 
showing the folly of materialism. Hence the author 
imagined himself a sensual materialist, and he talks 
like a sensual materialist. It would be just as rea- 
sonable to quote Paul's words, " Eat and drink, for 
to-morrow we die," to prove materialism, as to quote 
the passage you do. Paul's words, read in connection 
with his argument, are easily understood. So of 
Solomon's. It seems to me impossible for one to con- 
sider the passage quoted by you, when viewed with 
the design and construction of the argument, to have 
any countenance for non-hnmortalit}-. 

Take into consideration Solomon's views of the 
being and attributes of God ; his views as a Jew of 
the " spirit ; " his views of " hades," i. e., " sheol," &c, 
and then consider his words, " Then shall the dust 
(body) return to the earth as it was (before it became 
a bod}'), and the spirit shall return unto God who gave 



149 



it." These words, from a Jew, admit only one inter- 
pretation — God gives to a body a spirit ; when that 
body dies, God takes the spirit, or it returns to him, 
i. e., to his custody. 

Again, had Solomon spoken the words you have 
quoted as truth, he could not afterward have told 
the "young man, 1 ' "God will bring thee into judg- 
ment." Judgment with the Jew was after death. 
See Josephus on "hades." 

The next point you quote as an authoritative denial 
of immortality is, " in that day his thoughts shall per- 
ish." It is one thing to say of a man in dying, his 
" thoughts shall perish," and quite another to say 
the man shall perish. These words were spoken of 
" princes " who boast much, and promise and threaten 
much. Death stops their ambitious career, and the 
moment in which they die sees all their ambitious 
schemes (thoughts) fail (perish) forever. Their de- 
signs failing does not prove the princes annihilated. 

I am glad you state so freely that you found a 
new mode of interpreting the Bible ; for I had long 
ago made up my mind that you could have reached 
the conclusions you now hold only by adopting a new 
method of intrepreting the Bible. Herein I think you 
err. The Bible is a book written in human language, 
and by men for man. It must be studied as any other 
book is studied. The laws of interpretation common 
to men govern the Bible as well. These laws are as 
old as language. 

Nor do I believe that the writers of the Bible form 
any theories concerning the human soul or its destiny. 
" Hypotheses " are something in which Bible writers 
deal with a sparing hand. I can see exact correspon- 



150 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY? 

dence between the facts written by Bible men and the 
deductions drawn from them. If the phenomena of 
the Bible do not prove spirit incorruptibility, you 
can not find the doctrine taught by phenomena any- 
where. 

You quote Job, but he talked about matters of 
which he was ignorant. This Job* himself declares. 
Hear him. 

" Then Job answered the Lord, and said, I know 
that thou canst do eve^thing, and that no thought 
can be withholden from thee. Who is he that hideth 
counsel without knowledge ? therefore have I uttered 
that I understood not ; things too wonderful for me, 
which I knew not. Hear, I beseech thee, and I will 
speak : I will demand of thee, and declare thou unto 
me. I have heard of thee by the hearing of the ear ; 
but now mine eye seeth thee. Wherefore I abhor my- 
self, and repent in dust and ashes." Job xlii. 1-6. 

Job talked volubly about man and his soul. Yet he 
says, " I uttered that I understood not." Before this 
the Lord had said to him, " Who is this that darken- 
eth counsel by tvords ivithout knoivledge f " Job 
xxxviii. 2. Now, certainty to me the authoritative 
denial of man's immortality by Job would pass only 
for " words without knowledge." 

You speak feelingly of " the harmony between an- 
cient and modern Spiritualism." I believe, too, that 
there has ever been a " spiritualism " which was true ; 
also, I believe there has been and is a Spiritualism 
that has been and is false in the extreme. I do not 
say your Spiritualism is the latter. I trust it is not. 
So I am certain that, there have even been sensible 
evidences of the incorruptibility of the human spirit. 



parkee's sixth letter. 151 

They have never appeared to me, but others have 
witnessed them, and I am confident their testimony 
is true. 

You do not tell me wherein that "harmony" con- 
sists. I would like to get full information just here. 
You can not give me too much of it. 

Your quotations touching the modern phenomena 
which are presenting themselves, I need not notice 
fully. I have given them consideration, and now 
say, — 

1. I admit the occurrence of the facts. 

2. I deny that they are the work of spirits. 

Now, prove that spirits do the work, if you can. 
Please do not attempt to get out of this difficulty by 
asking me, in your next letter, " If these things are 
not done by spirits, then what does them?" At 
present I am not on the affirmative. You say these 
wonders are caused by spirits out of the body. I 
deny it, and call for the proof. 

I shall ask you now to peruse the following pages, 
which I cut from a book handed down to me from my 
grandfather. It contains facts which no rational man 
will dare dispute. One case like this, properly at- 
tested, comes clothed with power. It occurred one 
hundred and fifty years before "Spiritualism" was 
born, and was not invented for the purpose of mak- 
ing converts to a new u superstition." 

A Relation of the Apparition of Mrs. Veal. 

This thing is so rare in all its circumstances, and 
on so good authority, that my reading and conver- 
sation have not given me anything like it. It is fit 



152 SPIRITUALISM OK CHRISTIANITY? 

to gratify the most ingenious and serious inquirer. 
Mrs. Bargrave is the person to whom Mrs. Veal ap- 
peared after her death ; she is my intimate friend, and 
I can vouch for her reputation, for these last fifteen or 
sixteen years, on my own knowledge ; and I can con- 
firm the good character she had from her youth to 
the time of my acquaintance ; though since this rela- 
tion, she is calumniated by some people, that . are 
friends to the brother of Mrs. Veal, who appeared, 
who think the relation of this appearance to be a re- 
flection, and endeavor what they can to blast Mrs. 
Bargrave's reputation, and to laugh the story out of 
countenance. But by the circumstances thereof, and 
the cheerful disposition of Mrs. Bargrave, notwith- 
standing the ill usage of a very wicked husband, there 
is not yet the least sign of dejection in her face ; nor 
did I ever hear her let fall a desponding or murmur- 
ing expression ; nay, not when actually under her 
husband's barbarity, which I have been witness to, 
and several other persons of undoubted reputation. 

Now, you must know Mrs. Veal was a maiden gen- 
tlewoman, of about thirty years of age, and for some 
years last past had been troubled with fits, which 
were perceived coming on her by her going off from 
her discourse, very abruptly, to some impertinence; 
she was maintained by an only brother, and kept his 
house in Dover. She was a very pious woman, and 
her brother a very sober man, to all appearance ; but 
now he does all he can to null or quash the story. 
Mrs. Veal was intimately acquainted with Mrs. Bar- 
grave from her childhood. Mrs. Veal's circumstances 
were then mean ; her father did not take care of his 
children as he ought, so that they were exposed to hard- 



Parker's sixth letter. 153 

ships ; and Mrs. Bargrave in those days had as unkind 
a father, though she wanted neither for food nor cloth- 
ing, whilst Mrs. Veal wanted for both, insomuch that 
she would often say, " Mrs. Bargrave, you are not 
only the best, but the only friend I have in the world ; 
and no circumstance in life shall ever dissolve my 
friendship." They would often condole each other's 
adverse fortunes, and read together Drelincourt upon 
Death, and other good books ; and so, like two Chris- 
tian friends, they comforted each other under their 
sorrow. 

Some time after Mr. Veal's friends got him a place 
in the custom-house at Dover, which occasioned Mrs. 
Veal, by little and little, to fall off from her intimacy 
with Mrs. Bargrave, though there -was never any such 
thing as a quarrel, but an indifferency came on by de- 
grees, till at last Mrs. Bargrave had not seen her in 
two years and a half ; though above a twelvemonth 
of the time, Mrs. Bargrave hath been absent from 
Dover, and this last half year has been in Canterbury 
about two months of the time, dwelling in an house 
of her own. 

In this house, on the eighth of September, one thou- 
sand seven hundred and five, she was sitting alone in 
the forenoon, thinking over her unfortunate life, and 
arguing herself into a due resignation to Providence, 
though her condition seemed hard. And said she, 
"I have been provided for hitherto, and doubt not 
but I 'shall be still, and am well satisfied that my 
afflictions shall end when it is most fit for me." And 
then took up her sewing work, which she had no 
sooner done, but she hears a knocking at the door. 
She went to see who was there, and this proved to be 



154 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY? 

Mrs. Veal, her old friend, who was in a riding-habit. 
At that moment of time the clock struck twelve at 
noon. 

"Madam," says Mrs. Bargrave, "I am surprised to 
see you, you have been so long a stranger ; " but told 
her, " she was glad to see her," and offered to salute 
her, which Mrs. Veal complied with, till their lips al- 
most touched ; and then Mrs. Veal drew her hand 
cross her own eyes, and said, " I am not very well ; " 
and so waived it. She told Mrs. Bargrave she was 
going a journey, and had a great mind to see her first. 
But says Mrs. Bargrave, " How came you to take 
a journey alone ? I am amazed at it, because I know 
you have a fond brother." " O ! " says Mrs. Veal, " I 
gave my brother the slip, and came away, because I had 
so great a desire to see you before I took my journey." 
So Mrs. Bargrave went in with her into another room 
within the first ; and Mrs. Veal sat her down in an el- 
bow-chair, in which Mrs. Bargrave was sitting when she 
heard Mrs. Veal knock. Then says Mrs. Veal, " My 
dear friend, I am come to renew our old friendship again, 
and beg your pardon for my breach of it ; and if you 
can forgive me, yon are the best of women." " O," 
says Mrs. Bargrave, "do not mention such a thing. I 
have not had any uneasy thought about it ; I can easi- 
ly forgive it." "What did you think of me ? " said 
Mrs. Veal. Says Mrs. Bargrave, " I thought you 
were like the rest of the world, and that prosperity 
had made you forget yourself and me." Then Mrs. 
Veal reminded Mrs. Bargrave of the many friendly 
offices she did her in former days, and much of the 
conversation they had with each other in the times of 
their adversity; what books they read, and what com- 



Parker's sixth letter. 155 

fort, in particular, they received from Drelincourt's 
Book of Death, which was the best, she said, on that 
subject, ever written. She also mentioned Dr. Sher- 
lock, the two Dutch books which were translated, writ- 
ten upon death, and several others ; but Drelincourt, 
she said, had the clearest notions of death, and of the 
future state, of any who had handled that subject. 
Then she asked Mrs. Bargrave whether she had Dre- 
lincourt. She said, " Yes." Says Mrs. Veal, " Fetch 
it." And so Mrs. Bargrave goes up stairs, and brings 
it down. Says Mrs. Veal, "Dear Mrs. Bargrave, if 
the eyes of our faith were as open as the eyes of our 
body, we should see numbers of angels about us for 
our guard. The notions we have of heaven now are 
nothing like what it is, as Drelincourt says. There- 
fore be comforted under your afflictions, and believe 
that the Almighty has a particular regard to you, and 
that your afflictions are marks of God's favor; and 
when they have done the business they are sent for, 
they shall be removed from you. And believe me, 
my dear friend, believe what I say to you : one min- 
ute of future happiness will infinitely reward you for 
all your sufferings ; for I can never believe (and claps 
her hand upon her knee with great earnestness, which 
indeed ran through most of her discourse), that ever 
God will suffer you to spend all your clays in this af- 
flicted state ; but be assured that your afflictions shall 
leave you, or you them, in short time." She spoke in 
that pathetical and heavenly manner, that Mrs. Bar- 
grave wept several times, she was so deeply affected 
with it. 

Then Mrs. Veal mentioned Dr. Horneck's Ascetick, 
at the end of which he gives an account of the lives 



156 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY? 

of the primitive Christians. Their pattern she recom- 
mended to our imitation, and said, " Their conversa- 
tion was not like this of our age ; for now (says she) 
there is nothing but frothy, vain discourse, which is 
far different from theirs. Theirs was to edification, 
and to build one another up in faith; so that they 
were not as we are, nor are we as they were ; but 
(said she) we ought to do as they did. There was an 
hearty friendship among them; but where is it now 
to be found?" Says Mrs. Bargrave, " It is hard in- 
deed to find a true friend in these days." Says Mrs. 
Veal, " Mr. Norris has a fine copy of verses, called 
Friendship in Perfection, which I wonderfully admire. 
Have you seen the book?" says Mrs. Veal. "No," 
says Mrs. Bargrave ; " but I have the verses of my own 
writing out." " Have you? " says Mrs. Veal. "Then 
fetch them." Which she did from above stairs, and 
offered them to Mrs. Veal to read, who refused, and 
waived the thing, saying, " holding down her head 
would make it ache ; " and then desired Mrs. Bar- 
grave to read them to her, which she did. As they 
were admiring friendship, Mrs. Veal said, " Dear 
Mrs. Bargrave, I shall love you forever. In these 
verses there is twice used the word Elysian." " Ah ! " 
says Mrs. Veal, " these poets have such names for 
heaven ! " She would often draw her hand cross her 
own eyes, and say, "Mrs. Bargrave, do not you think 
I am mightily impaired by my fits?" "No," says 
Mrs. Bargrave ; " I think you look as well as ever I 
knew you." 

After all this discourse, which the apparition put 
in much finer words than Mrs. Bargrave said she 
could pretend to, and as much more than she can re- 



Parker's sixth letter. 157 

member (for it can not be thought that an hour and 
three quarters' conversation could all be retained, 
though the main of it, she thinks, she does), she said 
to Mrs. Bargrave she would have her write a let- 
ter to her brother, and tell him she would have him 
give rings to such and such ; and that there was a 
purse of gold in her cabinet, and that she would have 
two broad pieces given to her cousin Watson. 

Talking at this rate, Mrs. Bargrave thought that a 
fit was coming upon her, and so placed herself in a 
chair just before her knees, to keep her from falling 
to the ground, if her fits should occasion it (for the 
elbow-chair, she thought, would keep her from falling 
on either side) ; and to divert Mrs. Yeal, as she thought, 
took hold of her gown-sleeve several times, and com- 
mended it. Mrs. Veal told her it was a scoured 
silk, and newly made up. But for all this, Mrs. Yeal 
persisted in her request, and told Mrs. Bargrave she 
must not deny her ; and she would have her tell her 
brother all their conversation, when she had oppor- 
tunity. "Dear Mrs. Veal," says Mrs. Bargrave, "this 
seems so impertinent that T can not tell how to com- 
ply with it ; and what a mortifying story will our con- 
versation be to a young gentleman! Why," says 
Mrs. Bargrave, "it is much better, methinks, to do it 
yourself." " No," says Mrs. Yeal; " though it seems 
impertinent to you now, you will see more reason for 
it hereafter." Mrs. Bargrave then, to satisfy her im- 
portunity, was going to fetch a pen and ink ; but Mrs. 
Veal said, " Let it alone, now, but do it when I am 
gone ; but you must be sure to do it." Which was 
one of the last things she enjoined her at parting ; 
and so she promised her. 



158 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY? 

Then Mrs. Veal asked for Mrs. Bargrave's daugh- 
ter ; she said she was " not at home ; but if you have 
a mind to see her," says Mrs. Bargrave, I'll send for 
her." "Do," says Mrs. Veal. On which she left 
her, and went to a neighbor's to see for her ; and by 
the time Mrs. Bargrave was returning, Mrs. Veal was 
got without the door into the street, in the face of the 
beast-market, on a Saturday (which is market-day), 
and stood ready to part, as soon as Mrs. Bargrave 
came to her. She asked her why she was in such 
haste. She said she must be going, though per- 
haps she might not go her journey till Monday ; and 
told Mrs. Bargrave she hoped she should see her 
again at her cousin Watson's before she went whither 
she was going. Then she said she would take her 
leave of her, and walked from Mrs. Bargrave in her 
view, till a turning interrupted the sight of her, which 
was three quarters after one in the afternoon. 

Mrs. Veal died the 7th of September, at twelve 
o'clock at noon, of her fits, and had not above four 
hours senses before death, in which time she received 
the sacrament. The next day after Mrs. Veal's appear- 
ing, being Sunday, Mrs. Bargrave was mightily indis- 
posed with a cold and a sore throat, that she could 
not go out that day ; but on Monday morning she 
sent a person to Captain Watson's, to know if Mrs. 
Veal was there. They wondered at Mrs. Bargrave's 
inquiry ; and sent her word that she was not there, 
nor was expected. At this answer Mrs. Bargrave 
told the maid she had certainly mistook the name, or 
made some blunder. And though she was ill, she put 
on her hood, and went herself to Captain Watson's, 
though she knew none of the family, to see if Mrs. 



PARKER'S SIXTH LETTER. 159 

Veal was there or not. They said they wondered at 
her asking, for that she had not been in town ; they 
were sure, if she had, she would have been there. 
Says Mrs. Bargrave, "lam sure she was with me on 
Saturday, almost two hours." They said it was im- 
possible ; for they must have seen her, if she had. 
In comes Captain Watson, while they were in dispute, 
and said that Mrs. Veal was certainly dead, and her 
escutcheons were making. This strangely surprised 
Mrs. Bargrave, when she sent to the person immedi- 
ately who had the care of them, and found it true. Then 
she related the whole story to Captain Watson's fam- 
ily, and what gown she had on, and how striped ; and 
that Mrs. Veal told her it was scoured. Then Mrs. 
Watson cried out, " You have seen her indeed, for 
none knew, but Mrs. Veal and myself, that the gown 
was scoured." And Mrs. Watson owned that she 
described the gown exactly. " For," said she, " I 
helped her to make it up." This Mrs. Watson blazed 
all about the town, and avouched the demonstration 
of the truth of Mrs. Bargrave's seeing Mrs. Veal's 
apparition. And Captain Watson carried two gentle- 
men immediately to Mrs. Bargrave's house, to hear 
the relation from her own mouth. And Avhen it spread 
so fast that gentlemen and persons of quality, the ju- 
dicious and skeptical part of the world, flocked in upon 
her, it at last became such a task that she was forced 
to go out of the way ; for they were, in general, ex- 
tremely satisfied of the truth of the thing, and plainly 
saw that Mrs. Bargrave was no hypochondriac ; for 
she always appears with such a cheerful air, and pleas- 
ing mien, that she has gained the favor and esteem of 
all the gentry ; and it is thought a great favor if they 



160 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY ? 

can but get the relation from her own mouth. I 
should have told you before, that Mrs. Veal told Mrs. 
Bargrave that her sister and brother-in-law were just 
come down from London to see her. Says Mrs. Bar- 
grave, " How came you to order matters so strangely ? " 
"It could not be helped," said Mrs. Veal. And her 
brother and sister did come to see her, and entered the 
town of Dover just as Mrs. Veal was expiring. Mrs. 
Bargrave asked her whether she would drink some 
tea. Says Mrs. Veal, " I do not care if I do ; but I'll 
warrant you this mad fellow (meaning Mrs. Bar- 
grave's husband) has broke all your trinkets." 
"But," says Mrs. Bargrave, "I'll get something to 
drink in for all that ; " but Mrs. Veal waived it, and 
said, "It is no matter, let it alone;" and so it 
passed. 

All the time I sat with Mrs. Bargrave, which was 
some hours, she recollected fresh sayings of Mrs. Veal. 
And one material thing more she told Mrs. Bargrave 
— that old Mr. Breton allowed Mrs. Veal ten pounds a 
year ; which was a secret, and unknown to Mrs. Bar- 
grave till Mrs. Veal told it her. 

Mrs. Bargrave never varies in her story, which puz- 
zles those who doubt of the truth, or are unwilling to 
believe it. A servant in the neighbor's yard, adjoining 
to Mrs. Bargrave' s house, heard her talking to some- 
body an hour of the time Mrs. Veal was with her. 
Mrs. Bargrave went out to her next neighbor's the 
very moment she parted with Mrs. Veal, and told her 
what ravishing conversation she had with an old friend, 
and told the whole of it. Drelincourt's Book of Death 
is, since this happened, bought up strangely. And 
it is to be observed, that notwithstanding all the 



PARKER'S SIXTH LETTER. 161 

trouble and fatigue Mrs. Bargrave has undergone upon 
this account, she never took the value of a farthing, 
nor suffered her daughter to take anything of any- 
body, and therefore can have no interest in telling the 
story. 

But Mr. Veal does what he can to stifle the matter, 
and said he would see Mrs. Bargrave ; but yet it is 
certain matter of fact, that he has been at Captain 
Watson's since the death of his sister, and yet never 
went near Mrs. Bargrave; and some of his friends 
report her to be a liar, and that she knew of Mr. Bre- 
ton's ten pounds a year. But the person who pre- 
tends to say so has the reputation of a notorious liar 
among persons whom I know to be of undoubted 
credit. Now, Mr. Veal is more of a gentleman than 
to say she lies ; but says, a bad husband has crazed 
her. But she needs only present herself, and it will 
effectually confute that pretense. Mr. Veal says, he 
asked his sister, on her death-bed, " whether she had a 
mind to dispose of anything; " and she said, "No." 
Now, the things which Mrs. Veal's apparition would 
have disposed of were so trifling, and nothing of jus- 
tice aimed at in their disposal, that the design of it 
appears to me to be only in order to make Mrs. Bar- 
grave so to demonstrate the truth of her appearance, 
as to satisfy the world of the reality thereof, as to 
what she had seen and heard, and to secure her repu- 
tation among the reasonable and understanding part 
of mankind. And then again, Mr. Veal owns that 
there was a purse of gold ; but it was not found in 
her cabinet, but in a comb-box. This looks improba- 
ble; for that Mrs. Watson owned, that Mrs. Veal 
was so very careful of the key of the cabinet, that 
11 



162 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY ? 

she would trust nobody with it. And if so, no doubt 
she would not trust her gold out of it. And Mrs. Veal's 
often drawing her hand over her eyes, and asking Mrs. 
Bargrave whether her fits had not impaired her, looks 
to me as if she did it on purpose to remind Mrs. Bar- 
grave of her fits, to prepare her not to think it strange 
that she should put her upon writing to her brother 
to dispose of rings and gold, which looks so much like 
a dying person's request ; and it took accordingly 
with Mrs. Bargrave, as the effects of her fits coming 
upon her, and was one of the many instances of her 
wonderful love to her, and care of her, that she should 
not be affrighted ; which indeed appears in her whole 
management, particularly in her coming to her in the 
daytime, waiving the salutation, and when she was 
alone ; and then the manner of her parting, to prevent 
a second attempt to salute her. 

Now, why Mr. Veal should think this relation a 
reflection (as it is plain he does, by his endeavoring 
to stifle it) I can not imagine ; because the generality 
believe her to be a good spirit, her discourse was so 
heavenly. Her two great errands were to comfort 
Mrs. Bargrave in her affliction, and to ask her forgive- 
ness for the breach of friendship, and with a pious 
discourse to encourage her. So that, after all, to sup- 
pose that Mrs. Bargrave could hatch such an inven- 
tion as this from Friday noon till Saturday noon 
(supposing that she knew of Mrs. Veal's death the 
very first moment) without jumbling circumstances, 
and without any interest too, she must be more witty, 
fortunate, and wicked too, than any indifferent per- 
son, I dare say, will allow. I asked Mrs. Bargrave 
several times if she was sure she felt the gown ; she 



parkee's sixth letter. 163 

answered modestly, "If my senses be to be relied on, 
I am sure of it." I asked her if she heard a sound 
when she clapped her hand upon her knee ; she said 
she did not remember she did ; but said she appeared 
to be as much a substance as I did, who talked with 
her. " And I may," said she, "be as soon persuaded 
that your apparition is talking to me now, as that I 
did not really see her ; for I was under no manner of 
fear, and received her as a friend, and parted with 
her as such. I would not," says she, " give one far- 
thing to make any one believe it: I have no interest 
in it ; nothing but trouble is entailed upon me for a 
long time, for aught I know ; and had it not come to 
light by accident, it would never have been made 
public." But now, she says, she will make her own 
private use of it, and keep herself out of the way as 
much as she can ; and so she has done since. She 
says she had a gentleman who came thirty miles to 
her to hear the relation ; and that she had told it to 
a room full of people at a time. Several particular 
gentlemen have had the story from Mrs. Bargrave's 
own mouth. 

This thing has very much affected me, and I am 
as well satisfied as I am of the best-grounded mat- 
ter of fact. And why we should dispute matter of 
fact, because we can not solve things of which we 
can have no certain or demonstrative notions, seems 
strange to me. Mrs. Bargrave's authority and sin- 
cerity alone would have been undoubted in any other 
case. 

I will make no comments now on the foregoing. I 
desire to perpetuate its remembrance, and hence have 



164 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY ? 

mutilated an ancient volume in order to give these 
pages again to the world. In my next I may give 
you more on the subject of " jmenomena." 
Hoping for a speedy response, 

I am, as ever, &c, 

W. F. Parker. 



hull's seventh letter. 165 



MOSES HULL'S SEVENTH LETTER. 



New London, Conn., 
October 7, 1872. 



} 

Brother Parker : Yours of the 25th ult. greeted 
me on my arrival here Saturday night. I can not say 
of 3 r our letters as you do of mine, "Your letters are 
getting remarkably short." Indeed, you seem to have 
entirely ignored "the soul of wit." As your ideas 
thin out, your letters become more prolix than before. 
In this I shall not imitate your example. As long as 
one half of all you say is on my side of the ques- 
tion, and half of the remainder is irrelevant matter, 
I will indulge you in an extra amount of verbosity. 

I. I am heartily glad to see the expressions of willing- 
ness to investigate and step out on truth wherever 
found. I think them sincere, and shall take courage, 
and labor more earnestly for your conversion. 

II. You have not as jet been able to see why you 
should " reject the Bible for the documents of modern 
Spiritualism." Brother, please read my letters again, 
and see if I have ever asked you to " reject the Bible," 
or receive the documents of " modern Spiritualism." 
All I ask of any one is to receive the truths, and reject 
the errors of both. You seem to think it is impossible 
to embrace Spiritualism without rejecting the Bible, 
or see anything good in the writings of A. J. Davis 
without first seeing that those of Paul and Peter are 
all bad. In this you have failed to understand me 



166 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY? 

and a great majority of spiritualistic writers. I do 
not point out the errors in the Bible to claim that the 
Bible is all error ; only to show that, like other books, 
it is liable to err. I would not advise you to trust 
your "morals and safety" with Paul, Peter, A.J. 
Davis, or J. M. Peebles. On this subject " call no 
man master." Take W. F. Parker for your guide. 

III. And so you ignore the marriage question ! 
Well done. You first assaulted Spiritualism on that ; 
now that I have repelled the attack, and given you 
some samples of biblical marriage, you think it well to 
drop that part of the controversy. On that, silence 
for you is the best argument. 

IV. One element, almost indispensable to a good 
debater, you lack; that is memory. In letter V., and 
section I., you say, "I did not expect to reconvert 
you to Christianity. That would be, I dare say, a 
hopeless task. For to such ones as yourself, I believe 
the words of Paul forcibly apply." You then quote 
Heb. vi. 4-6. In your last letter, section L, we have 
the following: " Your first point is burdened, to my 
mind, with a strange error. You seem to assume that 
Christianity, once rejected, is never adopted. Paul 
knew nothing like this, and the experience of multi- 
tudes is against it." Again you say, in the same 
section, " I expect to see the day when Moses Hull 
will feelingly retract all he has said against God, the 
Bible, and Christianity." 

Does that look any like Parker vs. Parker ? Which 
of these prophecies shall I believe ? 

V. I can not imagine why you wish to burden our 
readers with that gossipy letter from Joseph Barker. 
It contains the fact that he has joined one church and 



167 



preaches for another. He has changed, but does not, 
and confesses he can not, tell why. No " event, man, 
or book " brought it about. He hopes to be able some 
day to make known " the change which has taken place 
in his views and feelings, and the considerations and 
influences which, under God, brought it about." If 
Mr. Barker can not make it known, some of his old 
friends can. How strange it was that simultaneously 
with his conversion to Christ he renounced his abo- 
litionism, his reformatory sentiments, became an aris- 
tocrat, and went to Europe to plead the cause of the 
rebels against the best government in the world. 
Brother Parker, you are welcome to him, especially 
till he gives some reason for his faith, or accepts the 
challenge of some of his former associates to meet the 
issue. 

The long extract you give from Barker's speech is 
as good, and no better, than if Parker, instead of Bar- 
ker, had said it. Where is the argument in it ? What 
fact does he state ? What irresistible conclusion does 
he draw? What is there in it more than a vulgar 
appeal to ignorant young men, to frighten them from 
investigation ? If you will compare it with Mr. Bar- 
ker's own speeches, made while he was an infidel, you 
will never again be guilty of using it as argument, or 
even as ad captandum. It will not frighten thinkers. 
Is it possible that Mr. Barker has labored ten years to 
produce nothing better than the two extracts you 
produce from him? And is this the Joseph Barker 
before whom not a Christian on earth could stand ? 
Who would have believed that such a giant could in 
his dotage have become such an imbecile ? " Let him 
that stands take heed lest he fall." 



168 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY? 

VI. The lengthy quotation you make from Paul in 
Rom. xii. is good. Paul did say many good things. 
Yet in this, the Lest chapter Paul ever wrote, good 
works are secondary. The first thing in importance, 
as well as in the order laid down, is prophecy, faith, 
ministry, exhortation, &c. Then good works follow 
as a secondary consideration. You think Paul's argu- 
ment, "created in Christ Jesus unto good works," 
squarely against me. So it would seem ; but if you 
will read the remainder of the chapter, you will learn 
what the good works were. They were simply the 
work of accepting the blood of Christ, and "building 
upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, 
Jesus Christ himself being the chief corner-stone." 
Eph. ii. 13-20. 

VII. You still think Paul the father of the Baconian 
system of philosophy, because he believed in testing 
things by experiment. That is a new argument, but 
it does not fit your case, since Moses, Joshua, and 
David all argued the same thing. 

VIII. I have heard nothing about the " dispute 
between us about which was the best medium, David, 
Paul, Swedenborg, or A. J. Davis." That dispute 
has been a one-sided affair. I have not said which 
was the best. The dispute on your part has been 
whether Swedenborg and Davis were mediums at 
all. The quality of their mediumship is an after con- 
sideration. 

You ask for my definition of inspiration. The fol- 
lowing, taken from a book you will find almost every- 
where, is as good as I have : — 

" Inspiration. 1. Act of inspiring, breathing in, 
infusing, and the like ; inhalation. 



169 

2. An extraordinary elevation of the powers of 
the soul. 

3. The result of such extraordinary elevation in 
the thoughts, emotions, or purposes inspired. 

4. Specifically, a supernatural divine influence on the 
sacred writers, by which they were qualified to com- 
municate moral or religious truth with authority." 

The second in this series of definitions would tell 
better than either of the others what I mean by the 
term in this debate. You want proof that Davis and 
Swedenborg are inspired at all. My dear brother, 
you will find it in their writings. 

IX. You really are a convert ! You have learned 
that the race has progressed a great way since Moses' 
day ; that even since the introduction of Christianity 
it has grown not a little. Good ! Now, will you tie 
me back to the dark ages of Moses and Jesus ? Shall 
I put the new wine of present inspiration into those 
old bottles ? Brother, let us be consistent ! You 
again undertake to defend the murderer, Moses — 
that is a great undertaking ! I know you hate to 
have me " drag up history to blacken the reputation 
of human beings ; " but has the thought occurred to 
you, that I could not "drag up evil history " if it had 
not been written ? You have been holding up those 
men and their inspirations as perfect. I, from their 
own history, show you their imperfections, and then 
you accuse me of dragging up evil history ! My 
brother, while you have a perfect right to object to my 
course, please don't slander me, by accusing my course 
of being too much like that of some Christians ! ! 

The following paragraph looks good, but it cer- 
tainly comes with a bad grace from one who has said 



170 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY? 

so many mean things of Spiritualists as have fallen 
from your lips and pen. I can hardly resist the temp- 
tation to say, " Physician, heal thyself." But to the 
paragraph. Here it is : " A religion which can not be 
blind to faults and errors is no religion for humanity. 
True charity will never repeat the sorrowful para- 
graphs in any individual's history." 

And this is the way, after denouncing Spiritualists 
and Spiritualism as you have, you would beg for 
mercy in behalf of the Bible-makers. Well, he must 
indeed be hard-hearted who would be deaf to so 
humble a prayer ! 

X. You say, " Alluding to the law of Christ as a 
fabric of the past," that I said, " We could now make a 
better one." Did I ? Read that again. It is strange 
I should say that, when Christ never made a law at 
all. Christ was neither a law-maker nor enunciator 
of new principles. No ; here is what I said : " My 
great objection to the Bible is, it is but the child of 
the moral, mental, and theological standards of the 
nation and time in which it was written. We could 
now make a better one." When I say that, I do not 
mean we can find better principles than some there 
are copied into the Bible, but we can leave out some 
of the bad ones. 

XI. I do not really suppose that any " eye-wit- 
nesses" ever saw Jesus in Egypt, or anywhere else, 
between the ages of twelve and thirty, or at any other 
time. Yet I promise you that when I can get access 
to my library, I will produce as much authority for 
saying Jesus spent those days in Egypt, as you can 
that he spent any time there. You certainly are not 
so poorly posted as not to know that an ancient*, 



hull's seventh letter. 171 

argument against Christianity was, that he learned 
his tricks and received his education of Egyptian 
magicians. 

XII. And now your cause is damaged by your bad 
memory again. You say, " As to Jonah, I will further 
say,— 

1. Jesus calls him a prophet ; did I say he did not ? 

2. The word " prophet " in the New Testament 
means, sometimes, simply " preacher." 

In order that you may answer your own argument, 
and convince yourself that you flounder around and 
place yourself on all sides of every question, I will let 
you read your own words as recorded in your sixth re- 
sponse, section VIII. " Allow me to assure you that 
you have no authority for calling Jonah's preaching 
prophecy. Jonah does not call it prophecy, nor does 
the historian of Jonah call it so, nor does any other 
Bible writer known to me call it so ; why, then, should 
you call it prophecy ? There is a wide difference be- 
tween prophecy and preaching. Jonah was a preacher, 
but not a prophet." 

There, brother Parker, as they say in your state, 
"How is that for high?" I will not comment. 
"Brevity is my sole aim." 

XIII. You say, " Others have found evidences 
(of immortality) there (in the Bible) ; and I am 
amongst them. In fact, the Bible seems to be full of 
the doctrine of immortality, so full that all the phe- 
nomena claimed by Spiritualists can add nothing to 
my faith." 

I answer, — 

1. The Bible may be full " of the doctrine of im- 
mortality," and yet lack the evidence. It is evidence, 
and not doctrine, we want. 



172 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY? 

2. It is not faith, but knowledge, we are after. You 
confess yours is but faith. Spiritualists claim more. 

3. Please tell me where the Bible teaches immor- 
tality. I defy you to prove immortality by that book 
without proving Spiritualism. 

My quotations from the Bible you think amount to 
but little, as the author of the book of Ecclesiastes 
Wrote on "purpose to show up materialism," and Job 
" uttered things he understood not." As to the latter, 
I have no doubt of the truth of it. There never was 
a Bible writer in the world but that uttered things 
which he nor no one else could understand. But 
what a nice way you Christians have of disputing a 
Bible text ! When I differ with any of these old fel- 
lows, I am at once denounced as an infidel ; when you 
dispute them, it is, " O, they did not understand 
themselves." 

By the by, what a strange way that book of Ec- 
clesiastes has of " showing up materialism; " it argues 
it from first to last. The only text opposing it you 
quote. But Dr. Clarke and other eminent critics tell 
us that is an interpolation. What a pity that the 
only text in all the book that hints toward another 
world should be interpolated, and of heathen origin. 
If more heathen texts had got into the Bible, it would 
have been a better book. 

You refer me to Solomon's views of the attributes 
of God, but you do not tell me how you learn them. 
You quote, " Then shall the dust return to the dust as 
it was, and the spirit shall return to God who gave it." 
But to the scholar that means nothing, as all scholars 
argue that the original word rendered spirit is the 
same as in Ps. cxli., " His breath goeth forth." When 



hull's seventh letter. 173 

the objection is urged that the breath does not go to 
God, that is met by a writer in the book of Job, who 
declares that if he gathers to himself his spirit and 
his breath, all flesh shall perish together, &c. Job 
xxxiv. 14, 15. It is laughable for you to send me to 
Josephus for Solomon's views of Hades. Did you not 
know that Josephus and Solomon were two different 
persons, living in different ages of the world ? Jo- 
sephus was after the Babylonish captivity — after 
Jesus. No one disputes but that the Jews learned 
important lessons from their captors. Then Jesus, 
with his Egyptianism, may have taught Josephus some 
important lessons. 

XIV. You .next come to the sage conclusion, that, 
"if the phenomena of the Bible do not prove spirit in- 
corruptibility, you can not find the doctrine taught by 
phenomena anywhere." 

That may be true. The phenomenon of the return 
of Samuel to Saul may be as good to him as the phe- 
nomenon of the return of Alexander Campbell would 
be to you. But it is not the same to you. 

1. It is Saul, and not W. F. Parker, who saw the 
sight. 

2. The circumstances may not be all recorded. 

3. There may be errors in their translation. 

4. Saul may not have been so competent a witness 
as yourself. 

5. The statement is only historical ; you could not 
swear to it as you could if your eyes had been the wit- 
nesses ; and, 

6. You don't know who wrote the history. 

I submit that the phenomena themselves are bet- 
ter evidence than their mere history could possibly 



174 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY ? 

be ; in the Bible you have the history of the mani- 
festations ; in Spiritualism, the manifestations them- 
selves. 

XV. I must take this opportunity to thank you 
for the admission you make in the latter part of sec- 
tion IX. You believe there is and always has been a 
true Spiritualism. You also believe the phenomenal 
facts I quoted did occur, but deny that they were the 
work of spirits. A man of your ability certainly 
would not deny without a reason ; he might doubt, 
but could not deny. 

You ask me to prove that spirits do the work. Will 
you prove that Mr. Parker writes the letters I get 
from him. They look to me much like " machine " 
letters, and I rather question whether he ever wrote 
them. In fact, I " deny " it ; now, will you prove it ? 

Here are some of the evidences that the manifesta- 
tions are from spirits. 

1. They are intelligent. 

2. They universally say they are spirits, as you say 
you are W. F. Parker. 

3. They sign names of friends well known in 
earth life, and in many instances not known to the 
medium. 

4. They give tests, such as the relation of incidents 
only known to the sitter and the one purporting to 
give the communications ; and, 

5. They often relate circumstances not known to 
the sitter, but known to the spirit, which afterward 
prove to be true. 

Permit me here to relate one instance. I met a me- 
dium in Boston. about a month since, who said, " Who 
is Eddie ? " I replied, " I had a brother-in-law Eddie 



hull's seventh letter. 175 

killed in the war." " O, it is not he," said the medium ; 
" this Eddie is not over two years old; and here is lit- 
tle Victoria with him, not over ten months old ; they 
are brought here by your sister Harriet. They have 
been in the spirit world but a few days." I went to 
Springfield the next day, and received a letter from 
my brother, D. W. Hull, informing me of the birth 
of his little Victoria into the spirit world, and one 
from my wife, informing me of the death of my little 
nephew, Eddie Earle. Will my brother give an ex- 
planation of this ? 

XVI.* I am very glad indeed you give me that twelve 
page extract from that old document. I could not have 
asked you to indulge me in so lengthy an extract, and 
as it is a positive proof of Spiritualism, and a proof 
of my proposition that these phenomena always have 
existed, I hope it will have the effect to open the 
eyes of your brethren. It certainly will go further 
than if it had appeared in my letter instead of yours. 
Brother, you will never overcome the argument in 
that extract. 

Permit me to relate one incident as stated by Rev. 
J. G. Fish, in his debate with Mr. Dunn, which I trust 
will go far toward convincing you of the identity of 
the spirit commiuiicating. " I once visited a cele- 
brated medium — Mrs. Robinson, of Massachusetts. 
I went into her room. I had never seen her. She 



* Since the MS. of this letter was sent to Mr. Parker, I have 
ascertained that there are strong probabilities that the facts in Mr. 
Parker's twelve page document, are apocryphal. It was written 
by De Foe, the author of Robinson Crusoe. Though De Foe was 
a Spiritualist, he undoubtedly wrote this for the same purpose he 
did many other apocryphal stories. M. H. 



176 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY? 

addressed me as my mother. I had a recent letter 
from my mother in my pocket, and knew nothing of 
her death, and so stated to the medium ; but she re- 
plied, ' Yes, I am your mother.' I called for some test 
by which I might know if it were she. She replied, 
' In my last conversation with you I told you I re- 
garded you as deluded, but I pledged you that if 
Spiritualism were true, I would seize the first oppor- 
tunity after my decease to come to you. My son, you 
are right — Spiritualism is true ; and I, your mother, 
who would not shake hands with you, now greet you 
from my immortal home. 1 

" I felt disgusted, almost. I did not believe one, word 
of it ; did not believe I had a mother in the spirit 
land. It is true the letter I had was ten days old 
when I received it ; but she was, at the time of the 
writing of it, alive and well. Five days after this, 
while debating with Elder Grant, of Boston, I was 
passing the post-office, and received a letter ; thrust 
it into my pocket, and went to the hall. I opened the 
letter there, and judge of my surprise, on reading it, 
to find that my mother passed into spirit life on the 
29th of January, five days before she came to me 
through the medium. She did not sleep beneath the 
clods of earth." 

I still expect to hear of your conversion to Spirit- 
ualism. 

As ever, 

Moses Hull. 



Parker's seventh letter. 177 



W. F. PARKER'S SEVENTH REPLY. , 

Cedar Hill, near La Grange, Ky., > 
October 31, 1872. 5 

Brother Hull : I ought to have answered your 
letter of the 7th inst. before to-day ; but I have been 
so fully pre-occupied that delay with me has been a 
matter of necessity. 

From this time forth for some months I shall be 
fully occupied, and our correspondence will be com- 
pelled to drag heavily. I therefore propose that we 
close further writing, and let the case go to the jury. 

I will say, however, that I have not seen fit to dis- 
cuss the phenomena of Spiritualism, from the fact 
that I know nothing about them. I have heard of 
things remarkable said to have been done by spirits. 
So, recently, I have heard of remarkable miracles in 
Europe done by Roman Catholic priests. I do not 
believe either class of reports, as they come to me. 
But that unusual facts have manifested themselves 
both among the Spiritualists and Papists, I am willing 
to accept on the word of those who say they have wit- 
nessed them. I do not and can not feel any interest 
in these matters. 

That "ghosts" have been seen by some persons I 
have no doubt ; but what of it ? You may say it is a 
demonstration of immortality. Well, that demonstra- 
tion, then, has been in the world for six thousand years, 
12 



178 SPIRITUALISM OR CHRISTIANITY? 

and we are not indebted to modern Spiritualism for 
it. I can not become a Spiritualist for this reason. 

I have read your letters carefully, and I think dis- 
passionately, and I see no reason why I should cease 
to be a follower of Jesus of Nazareth. I am satisfied 
with my understanding of the teachings of prophets 
and apostles, and shall cleave to them until I see bet- 
ter reasons than I have seen in the writings of any 
Spiritualist, Infidel, or Atheist, for abandoning them. 

I can not, in all the world of Spiritualism, find one 
new truth ; nor one old truth put into a more accepta- 
ble form. 

My brother, you have my kindest regards ; and hop- 
ing that our labors for the common good may not be 
in vain, 

I am, as ever, 

W. F. Parker. 



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